A young Latvian in Germany found himself in an unpleasant situation when, in one of the city bars, he paid for 16 glasses of beer with a payment card – for each beer separately. This angered the bar owner. The situation became so tense that the police had to be called to the scene. On Monday evening, a 21-year-old man ordered beer at a restaurant and paid for it with a debit card. He did the same with the second beer. And with the third. After the 16th glass, the bar owner began to be indignant. He was angry that he had to pay a fee of about 20 cents for every card transaction. So paying for 16 glasses for one customer was "quite a bad deal" for him. But by the time the owner's patience ran out, the guest had become "completely insane," writes Spiegel Panorama, and the restaurant called the police. The young man did not cooperate with law enforcement officers and did not comply with their demands. There were also communication problems, a police spokesman said. Security guards took the guest out of the bar and forbade him to return. According to the German news site br.de, in Germany, restaurant owners can decide for themselves whether to accept card payments and for what amount, since this always involves additional costs. Businesses are not required to allow card payments. At the same time, the German publication notes that in Latvia, where the participant in the conflict lives, and in the Baltic countries in general, people are accustomed to paying by card, including for small purchases, and this practice is only welcomed. The publication also notes the high level of digitalization in the everyday life of Latvian residents. As reported, last year the number of face-to-face purchases of goods and services for which Latvians paid with payment cards increased by almost a fifth (18%), according to information compiled by Swedbank. The number of contactless payments has also increased by more than half, or 61%, when residents prefer to make payments via smartphone or e-wallet. Most often (68%) residents used payment cards to pay in person at retail establishments, and in half of the cases (50%) they made purchases in grocery stores. The largest volume (70%) of face-to-face transactions with non-cash money was noted in Riga and its surroundings. The number of enterprises that accept non-cash payments also increased by 4%, in turn, the total number of POS terminals in physical retail locations increased by 8%. By the way, Latvian merchants also pay commissions for using payment cards. Even 10-15 years ago, in some stores you could see an advertisement: if the purchase is less than a certain amount, then you can only pay in cash. Merchants explained this decision by the large commissions they must pay to banks for card processing. If the purchase amount was too small, it was simply unprofitable for the store to accept cards. It may seem that those days are long gone and you can pay with a payment card everywhere and for any purchase. However, this is not the case – there are still merchants who only allow small purchases to be paid in cash. More details in the article – “We accept the card for purchases from one euro.” Can a store restrict the payment method?