Anti-Paper-Receipts

It's Earth Day today, and in honor of this day I'd like to put one small Earth-changing suggestion out into the universe.

I wish more retailers would have the option to email receipts, or the option to not even print a receipt if I don't want one. The only reason my purse ever gets filled with clutter is due to the ungodly amount of receipts that get shoved in there for weeks on end. I never take them back out, I rarely look at them again, I don't do anything with them. They are a waste of ink and paper on me.

There are some items that just don't need a receipt either. When I buy a soda at the gas station, I don't need a receipt. I can't return the item, neither would I ever need proof that I bought it.

I realize some people might still want receipts to balance their checkbook, and that's fine. But if you're like us and you charge everything in order to reap the cash-back benefits, it's not as essential. Again, just email it to me, if I need to check it against what was charged to my card it would be so much easier to pull up a folder of PDFs than to dig through my purse of tiny papers.

I would gladly set up an email account with a phony name to use specifically for this purpose (in case the privacy concern crossed your mind, like it did mine.) Square has jumped on this idea, and I wish others would too. In this day and age, it just makes sense.