Full Conversion Urged

Press, Volume CV, Issue 31005, 10 March 1966, Page 18

Full Conversion Urged

(N.Z. Press Association) NEW PLYMOUTH, March 9. The New Zealand Retailers’ Federation has criticised the Decimal Currency Board’s policy in adopting partial rather than complete conversion of accounting machines and cash registers to decimal currency. At its annual conference today the federation adopted a resolution urging the Government to accept full rather than partial conversion. Mr A. S. Radford who moved the motion, said time was running short and a decision must be reached as soon as possible. ’ Most retailers appeared to favour full conversion because there would be no loss of machine capacity, as would occur in partial conversion. Partial conversion involves the suppression of certain columns on the machines, usually the pence column. This method means a reduction in machine capacity which could be as tow as 50 per cent in some machines and vary between 50 and 95 per cent in others. Mr S. L. Moses, the chairman of the Decimal Currency Board, considered partial conversion “perfectly satisfactory” and expected no loss in machine efficiency. The board favoured partial conversion rather than full conversion because of sev-

eral favourable features, said Mr Moses.

“The major advantages will be the savings in overseas funds that partial conversion would create,” he said. He estimated the savings could be £1,000,000 to £2,000,000.

Another advantage was that partial conversion could be done on the retailers’ premises and would not involve the removal of the machines for up to three weeks.

Another feature was the decreased chances of breakdowns with partial conversions as there would be fewer new parts working with old. The break-down problem had become acute during the change-over period in Australia, said Mr Moses. The board had almost completed a national survey of accounting machines and cash registers to find out their suitability for conversion, Mr Moses said.