Continental Airlines announced on Monday that they will be doing away with cash and only accepting credit and debit cards for onboard purchases effective today.

For now it appears that the cashless cabins will only be on “most” of CA’s fleet, but we expect it will go all plastic in the near future. The one route still accepting cash is the Houston-based airline’s service to and from China.

But fear not fans of duty-free items, as cash is still accepted on international flights. So you can still hand over a crisp $50 for that bottle of whiskey.

Continental further added that cash will also still being accepted on Continental Express, Continental Connection and Continental Micronesia flights. But Continental plans to switch them all to a cashless cabin by the first quarter of 2010.

Source: The Associated Press and image courtesy of Flickr member Pylon757