School Children’s Savings Bank System

Northern Advocate, 22 April 1939, Page 2

School Children’s Savings Bank System

Thousands of children in the primary schools have Post Office Schools Savings Bank accounts, and at the end of the year their savings had amounted co £66,000, an increase in one year of nearly £20,000. With the encouragement and active assistance of the school teachers, the Post Office conducts a special school savings bank, and when a child has saved 19/- an interest bonus of one shilling is added, to make up a total of £l, upon which interest is earned at the rate of 3 per

cent, per annum. Deposits are made with the teachers on fixed days weekly, the children making out their own deposit slips. The scheme operates in 750 schools, of which 450 are in the North Island and 300 in the South Island. Schools at Auckland and Hamilton are not included in the system because private savings banks provide similar facilities in those centres. The transactions are naturally small in amount, but they are large in the aggregate, the deposits last year totalling 389.574, representing in cash £38,104. The actual interest earned during the year exceeded £llOO. Withdrawals can be made from an account with the written approval of the child’s parents or guardian. The savings habit thus fostered is well sustained in later life as is evidenced by the fact that over half the school accounts are eventually carried on 1o the ordinary Post Office Savings Bank.