Cash Sale Receipts.

Star (Christchurch), Volume LXVI, Issue 20632, 5 June 1935, Page 8

Cash Sale Receipts.

Dear Sir, —“ Five Rob ” asks a question regarding the validity of a docket for a £3 cash sale that did not bear a revenue stamp. The facts about this procedure do not seem to be at all well known. Some months ago I put the question to a wellknown commercial gazette, to settle a wager. The answer, as also yours to your correspondent appears to be, was very vague.

A precedent has been made in a judgment in a test case (I believe it was at Palmerston North) and a full report of the finding was made in the “ Drapers’ Record ’* (the official “trade organ of the New Zealand drapers and boot and shoe retailers) some seven or eight years ago. It is not necessary to affix a revenue stamp for a cash sale for any amount of £2 or over, on certain conditions. The docket must not bear the legend “ Paid ” or “ Received.” Some firms have a plain rubber stamp, “ Cash Sale,” without a trade name or the initials of the clerk receiving the cash. Other firms use the stamp “ Passed the Office.” The same words can be written in pencil instead of being stamped. This “Cash Sale” method. I know, has been in 1 use extensively, as a result of that recorded judgment. If your correspondent had insisted on a stamp being affixed, he would no doubt have been obliged. Legally, without a 2d stamp, I do not doubt that, in case of disputed payment, the docket would be held to be invalid.

In actual practice, and I write definitely from personal experience, frequently an unstamped docket has been successfully presented to prove payment has been made. For instance, several hats have been sent out “on appro.”; one hat at 25s has been paid for, and a Cash Sale docket given (or it may be several suits, and a Cash Sale docket for “Suit £5”). By carelessness on the part of assistants, the hats or suits returned have not been cancelled from the appro, book, and at the end of the month an account is rendered to the customer. The customer naturally comes in to say that all the suits were returned, except the one paid for. Production of the Cash Sale docket, dated on day of purchase, helps a check back being made, and the error has been rectified. Only people guilty of sharp practice would deny the 'validity of payment shown on a “Cash Sale ” docket, if such were presented to prove an error in charges.—l am, etc.. L.S.D.

The Stamp Department’s contention, which is supported by Magisterial rulings, is that anything on a cash slip that denotes that money has changed hands con stitutes a receipt, and must be stamped. A receipt, however, is not necessary in any sale where money is exchanged for goods, Ed., “Star.”