DECIMAL COINS

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30559, 30 September 1964, Page 5

DECIMAL COINS

Possibility Of Profiteering "The Press” Special Service DUNEDIN, Sept. 29. It would be difficult for the Government to stop rounding of prices and minor profiteering with the change to decimal currency in 1967, the assistant secretary of the Decimal Currency Board (Mr C. C. Kilpatrick) told a luncheon meeting of the Otago branch of the New Zealand Institute of Public Administration. Mr Kilpatrick said the Government had indicated it would not allow any exploitation of cons tuners. “It will be difficult to stop it, and I don’t know how it can be done,” he said. Mr Kilpatrick said that many prices would be rounded, but they would probably balance out. An Boz glass of beer which costs 8d would be worth 6.6 cents under the decimal system. This would be rounded to the nearest figure— l cents. Mr Kilpatrick said it had been suggested that as Id would be equivalent to only .83 cents, people were hoarding pennies to profit on the change. “If they think they will exchange one penny for one cent they are mistaken, for all retailers and the public will be told to exchange six pennies for five cents,” he said. “It appears that the public are hoarding pennies, because the Treasury had to order an unprecedented £75,000 worth of pennies this year,” he said.