TLDR Disclaimer: A lot of my post covers our Covid-19 response and goes well beyond this cashless payments topic, so please ignore the stuff you don't find relevant.
Our business is a nail salon, so obviously all sales are in-person. Prior to Covid-19, our cash percentage was around 25% of gross sales. After we reopened with limited seating 2 months later, our cash percentage steadily declined each biweek to about 18% for the last 3. So yes it looks like cash is going out of style.
The Covid-19 safety guidelines have changed significantly since February. Now it seems that transmission by touch is much less dangerous than previously reported, while aerosol transmission is even more dangerous.
That being said, in our shop, we still take all precautions, whether currently recommended or not. We require all employees to wear masks and disposable gloves, all customers to wear masks (we sell them at nominal cost if they don't have their own) and we have provided an acrylic barrier at all manicure tables and pedicure chairs, we place hand sanitizer sprays outside the front door and at the receptionist desk, the bathroom, the public sinks, the manicure tables and the pedicure chairs and their tubs. We use disposable plastic pedicure liners in the pedicure chair tubs. Employees check each customer's temperature when they enter the shop, wipe down all touch surfaces including the front door and all interior handles, all chairs including employee and customer and pedicure, all tables including the receptionist desk, and the cash register and Square terminal after each use. Nobody touches the cash with bare hands.
So yes we still accept cash, as well as contactless payments, but we also require each customer to sign on the Square terminal if they dip or swipe. So we wipe that down before each use. We had tried the wax paper sheet trick mentioned in other posts here on Square community, but that was too cumbersome so now the customer sees us wipe the terminal before they sign, and they are comfortable with that.
We had thought about putting all the cash in an old UV sterilizer that we used to use for the tools until we bought some new ones, but since we wear gloves and then deposit at the bank, we decided the reduced risk factor didn't warrant the time and trouble. Anyway, nobody has contracted Covid-19 so far.
One step we are going to take when we are financially able to, is to install better ventilation in the salon. Some states are requiring beauty salons, in which chemical fumes occur, to install point-source capture systems where an exhaust vent rated at least 50 cubic feet per minute is placed within 18" of the source - i.e., on all manicure tables and pedicure tubs. While this was primarily to reduce or eliminate the fumes from the acetone and alcohol and polish from being inhaled by the customers and employees, it also works to greatly reduce aerosol transmission of viruses like Covid-19. Basically the contaminated air is removed through an energy recovery ventilator and vented outside the roof of the salon, where the viruses are quickly destroyed. Commercial energy recovery ventilators such as the Fantech SER 1100, can recover over 80% of the energy used to air condition incoming outside air, through a heat and humidity exchange process with the outgoing exhaust air. In a hot and humid climate like Florida, AC electric bills often run well over $400 a month; so an ERV system won't greatly increase that amount. In northern states, salons can get by with cheaper heat recovery ventilators, which don't use humidity exchange, and can recover up to 50% of the AC cooling or furnace heating energy.
So far our customers really like the precautions we have taken with the salon. We occasionally get the mask protestor customer who gets bent out of shape over our mask requirements, and have to ask them to leave, but the other customers applaud us afterwards, especially the regulars, so I think our policies and precautions build loyalty as well as provide a safe environment.
