California Lawmaker Introduces Bill To Eliminate Paper Receipts To Reduce Waste And Promote Digital Proof Of Purchase

Nicknamed “Skip the Slip,” bill AB 1347 would fine businesses for using paper slips longer than necessary and must be free of BPA/BPS coatings, if a customer requests a physical receipt. After two warnings businesses could be fined $25 for each day they don’t comply, with a maximum penalty of $300 per year.

In a press release published on Ting’s website, it noted: ‘The public health impacts are also alarming. The Ecology Center found 93 percent of receipts contain Bisphenol-A (BPA) and Bisphenol-S (BPS), which enable text to appear on the receipt. Our bodies can absorb some of these chemicals simply by touching the receipt. BPA and BPS are known endocrine disruptors and can cause developmental and neurological problems. These risks prompted Connecticut, Illinois and the European Union to ban the use of BPA on receipt paper.’

When we get coffee to-go or a pack of gum, most of us don’t want or need a physical receipt. It’s time we provide customers with the option to get no receipt or a digital receipt. It doesn’t make sense to kill so many trees and produce billions pounds of carbon emissions. AB 1347 gives customers a choice and still provides for customers to request a paper receipt when they need it.

Ting said in a statement

Our unwanted paper receipts contribute to unrecyclable litter and expose us to toxic endocrine disruptors such as BPA. By simply offering consumers alternatives, we can stop a completely unnecessary and wasteful use of our natural resources.

Chloe Brown from Californians Against Waste, said

https://youtu.be/tXsT2tMBPzA

As noted by Ting in the press release, Ting presented an identical bill in 2019 trying to achieve the same thing but it ultimately stalled-out. Some awareness has been generated because of it, leading to late night hosts like Jimmy Kimmel to talk about and other advocacy groups like Green America to get behind it.

CVS – known for their notoriously long receipts – added a prompt at check out nearly a year ago, allowing customers to pick between no receipt, an e-receipt or a paper receipt. Four months later, Green America says the move saved 87 million yards of receipt paper – enough to circle the globe twice. The organization also reports Whole Foods’ receipts are 50 percent shorter than they were in 2019.

The press release added

Businesses, cities, and countries are also eliminating paper transactions and filings all together. For example last year Dubai, in the United Arab of Emirates, has neared 100% digitalization of all transactions that were originally done in paper. Other stores around the world have become cashless and in some cases even “frictionless,” where customers simply grab what items they want and leave without any interaction, as the transactions are immediately docked from their bank accounts.

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AUTHOR COMMENTARY

As to why we ever allowed these toxic chemicals to be used is beyond me.

But this is obviously leaning into the digitalization of everything as society moves away from physical transactions and paying for things in cash, for the eventual removal of paper receipts are only a formality. Ultimately we all know what this is all culminating up to:

[16] And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: [17] And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. [18] Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.

Revelation 13:16-18

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[7] Who goeth a warfare any time at his own charges? who planteth a vineyard, and eateth not of the fruit thereof? or who feedeth a flock, and eateth not of the milk of the flock? [8] Say I these things as a man? or saith not the law the same also? [9] For it is written in the law of Moses, Thou shalt not muzzle the mouth of the ox that treadeth out the corn. Doth God take care for oxen? [10] Or saith he it altogether for our sakes? For our sakes, no doubt, this is written: that he that ploweth should plow in hope; and that he that thresheth in hope should be partaker of his hope. (1 Corinthians 9:7-10).

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