Learn English – How do natives say how they would like to pay

phrase-choicespoken-english

How do natives answer the question "How would you like to pay?" When I want to pay with my bank card, sometimes they ask credit or debit? Sometimes they ask Visa or Mastercard? So I now usually say "credit", or "Visa". Does that sound natural? Besides to what you think it's natural to say, what do you think about the following options?

  1. Card?
  2. Bank card?
  3. By card?
  4. With card?
  5. On my/the card?
  6. Credit/Debit (card)
  7. Visa/Mastercard

Additionally, what if you want to pay with cash?

  1. Cash?
  2. By cash?

Best Answer

How would you like to pay?

In short, informal interactions, such as with a cashier, it's perfectly fine to respond with one word. Or, you don't need to use a proper sentence with a subject and a verb:

  • Cash
  • Card
  • etc.

If you need to specify, again, you can be brief:

  • Visa
  • Mastercard
  • Apple Pay
  • Debit
  • Credit
  • etc.

If you want to use a preposition, you can use with. In my AmE opinion, you cannot use *by with cash or card:

  • With cash
  • With a/my card

This is generally short for I will pay with cash/my card, or in response to "Will you pay with cash or card?"

BrE users are saying "by card" works form them:

  • By card (BrE)

It wasn't mentioned in the OP and I completely forgot, but @JeremyC points out that you can say by check/cheque:

  • By check (AmE)
  • By cheque (BrE)

I think on my card is okay in a few cases:

  • You can charge it on my card.
  • You can put it on my card.

I agree with @J.R. Charge it to my card sounds better to me.

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