Costly Pitfalls In Dollar Shopping

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31113, 16 July 1966, Page 21

Costly Pitfalls In Dollar Shopping

Unless they are thoroughly “brainwashed” in the next 12 months, shop assistants may involve their employers in big losses through old money habits when New Zealand changes to decimal currency.

A couple of examples have been given by Mr B. Purdy, assistant secretary of the New Zealand Retailers’ Federation. Take the sum of Is 3d. Customers and shop assistants automatically think of it as 15 pence. Mr Purdy is afraid that shoppers wanting to buy an article priced at 15 cents may offer Is 3d for it without thinking—and have it accepted, again without thinking, by the shop assistant. The shop would lose 3d or nearly 17 per cent of the real price on the deal, because 15 cents will be equivalent to Is 6d —not Is 3d. On more expensive goods the shop could make a double loss. An article marked “15 guineas” during the dual currency period would cost 31 dollars 50 cents in decimal currency.

But a customer could easily forget and offer a 20-dollar note. If the shop assistant was

drawn into the same error and thought of the guineas as dollars, the immediate loss to the shop would be £5 15s—the difference between 20 dollars and 15 guineas. The second loss would occur when the shop assistant counted out 5 dollars in change (£2 10s). Together the losses on the transaction would total £8 ss, or more than 52 per cent of the price. These very real possibilities show the need for intensive training, particularly of those employees who will be making direct money transactions with customers.

Most of the big stores are well into their training programmes now, some of them borrowing ideas and material from associates in Australia. They are starting by training their executives and teams of trainers who will start teaching the main sales staff about next March. Within the Retailers’ Federation, which represents 40 per cent of all retail stores in New Zealand, the Auckland and Canterbury-West-land associations have started training programmes for shopkeepers, and the Federation has started a programme for members in other parts of the country. The federation’s training facilities are available to nonmembers, which will cater for hundreds of small businesses, and the Master Grocers’ Association is also holding threeday seminars. Changing to decimal currency will involve retailers in considerable costs. “1 think," said Mr Purdy, “that short of gearing itself for total war, a change of currency is probably the biggest undertaking a country could make. It would therefore be absurd to expect that it could be achieved without some cost or inconvenience to somebody.” He said that two large public companies were making provision for about 18 per cent of their annual dividend pay-out as the cost of changing to decimals, and another provided for about 10 per cent. Responsibility Accepted One national chain of stores expects the change to dollars i and cents to cost it about £25,000, and a Wellington department store expects to foot a bill for £BOOO. These costs arise from the purchase of new machines which otherwise would not have been necessary for some years, the replacement of old (but still efficient) machines for which there is no compensation from the Decimal Currency Board, staff training, printing of new stationery, extra price labelling and other internal changes. Competition in the retail trade is fierce, according to Mr Purdy, and the costs will not be recoverable through price increases. “A lot of 'them are sore about it,” he said, “but they accept it as their burden—a social responsibility to see that the change to decimal

currency goes as smoothly as possible.” He said there would be marginal benefits to retailers in the long run, because it would be easier and therefore cheaper for them to operate in dollars and cents. Time savings would be multiplied in big businesses. In addition retailers would be able to use a greater range of business machines, because some kinds were available only in decimals. Mr Purdy said the Retailers’ Federation was looking for ways of encouraging a faster change to dollars and cents in terms of public thinking and shopping—perhaps as quickly as six months from DC Day, instead of the predicted 18 months. “Some of the thinking on decimal currency is changing in Australia now,” he said “They are very anxious to speed up conversion to dollars and cents as far as the public image is concerned. Conversion of machinery cannot be speeded up, but business transactions can, with more emphasis on dollar advertising. “They want to get rid of the old £ s. d. more quickly. Their attitude over there seems to be ‘Let’s get on with it’—it is a natural impatience.” He said one of the possibilities which would be investigated by his federation was dealing with shop customers in decimal currency even where the cash register was still in £ s. d. “Shop assistants won’t be able to do that in the first few weeks,” he said, “but they will be able to when they have been handling decimal currency for a few months.”