BEER ON CREDIT

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXVIII, Issue 20636, 11 December 1941, Page 2

BEER ON CREDIT

PRACTICE TO CEASE "SLATE” DISAPPEARS Hotel customers who in the past have established credit at the bars of Gisborne houses will learn with regret that the “slate,” so long a feature of bar-room decorations, is to disappear. Notices to this effect has been given by the Poverty Bay Licensed Victuallers’ Association, and will apply to all houses in the district. Behind the decision is the compelling circumstar'ce that costs have increased to such an extent that even a small proportion of loss on credit sales is sufficient to offset the profit on a considerable turnover. Generally speaking, credit customers in Gisborne have a good record. Their numbers are principally made up of working men who have formed the habit of leaving their money at home on work-days, owing to the danger of loss from garments laid aside on the job. Their usage is to pay up at regular intervals, and the losses are mainly accounted for by sudden departures of men who are unable to “square the slate" before leaving the district. Difficulties of supply, in a time when stocks from overseas are hard to come by, also figure in the decision of the licensed victuallers. A further direction to barmen by the association is that all “shouting is to cease. This practice has been outside the law since the last war, when an anti-shouting amendment to the licensing laws was effected. Nevertheless, the practice has grown up in some bars of signalling .he close of each round anions a group, of customers with “one on the house. In the main centres, licensees have wiped out the custom by, notice of summary dismissal to any employee indulging in it, and Gisborne is now to come into line. It is pointed out that for the past nine years, Gisborne hotel-keepers have made no changes in the glass prices or'measurements, though costs of supply and service have steadily increased.