Many Millions in Small Remittances

Manawatu Times, Volume 64, Issue 111, 13 May 1939, Page 6

Many Millions in Small Remittances

MONEY-ORDERS AND POSTAL NOTES As ft medium for the circulation of money, postal notes and money-orders take no small place in New Zealand’s economic system. This safe and handy method of transmitting cash to all parts of the Dominion and overseas has shown remarkable expansion since the Domin ion emerged from the economic depression. The money-orders issued in New Zealand last year exceeded the 1933 total by no less a figure than £1,200,000. The great range of service which the postal-note and money-order system renders is evidenced from the fact that in a year the transactions total over 4} millions, representing cash exceeding £5,750,000. The accountacy associated with this busy section of the Post Office is on so large a scale that the department ’s system of machine accountane/ has to be utilised in the checks an i audit. A carefully designed system in connection with money-orders gives ample assurance that the person to whom payment is to be made actually receives the cash. When the order is issued, the Post Office independently forwards an advice to the paying office on which appears information not shown on the order in the hands of the remitter. This is the name of the remitter and the payee. The paying officer secures the signature of the person in whose favour the order has been issued, and he must give the name of the remitter before the cash is paid. A postal note can also be made payable to the order of any individual, although no separate advice can be prepared, because postal notes are payable at any post office or through any banking account in the same manner as a cheque. Lists of the money-orders issued are forwarded to the General Post Office, rnd if the order is paid in New Zealand this is also sent to the accountancy branch. Overseas orders are recorded In lists regularly forwarded to New Zealand. Machine Accountancy. All the money-oraers paid in New Zealand come to the machine accountancy section of the General Post Office, where a card is punched for each, detailing the office of origin, the amount and other information. There are 900 money-order offices each having its own distinctive number for machine accountancy purposes, and many thousands of cards carrying all this information go to a sorting machine, to emerge in separate bundles each relating to a particular office and in numerical sequence. Then the punched cards go through the tabulating machines to secure a typed record of the detailed transactions and the total in respect of each office, which is important for audit purposes. One post office may issue 500 money-orders payable in several hundred different places, but after they are paid all, excepting those sent abroad, come back to the General Post Office and its machine accountancy branch. Postal notes after payment also come back to the same point for numerical sorting of each denomination so that they can be quickly referred to if necessity arises. Postal notes are issued in 39 denominations, and it is possible to make up other totals by the addition of a few postage stamps. The magnitude of the postal-note business is so great that this minor phase has involved use in one year of nearly £14,000 worth of stamps. As the money-order system is worldwide, the financial division of the General Post Office has to make regular settlements with the British and foreign postal administrations, based on the balance of payments and receipts, and as New Zealand is, in economic phraseology, a debtor country, the New Zealand Post Office generally has to remit rather than to receive.