Item: 1 NZ $10 bill
I was pleasantly surprised, when withdrawing money from a machine at the airport in New Zealand, to find that it included both 10 and 20-dollar bills. The first time I was in Europe, I was also amazed to discover that they still dispensed denominations of 10 Euros, and I believe the machine I used in South America gave smaller bills as well.
I remember when I worked for a financial institution that had a number of ATMs, most of which dispensed US $20s, one of which dispensed $10 bills, and a few more of which gave both 20s and 5s. When these were replaced with newer models, they were all converted to give US $20 bills only. This was done for economic reasons, it being more efficient to deal in 1 denomination only. Also, being able to load up a machine with as much cash as possible increases the length of time it can handle transactions without needing anybody to come refill it. And I imagine it was to their benefit to have transactions for larger dollar amounts when it came to interchange income.
You know, it's an awfully useful thing sometimes to have 10s or 5s. Having only 20s available means that I often have to take out more than I need, to be sure of having enough, if that makes sense. It also means, when a group of people are out at a restaurant, and the bill comes and the only thing anyone has is 20s (also known as "paying with yuppie food stamps"), it means multiple subsequent calculations on how much everyone should get back. This puts restaurants and other businesses in the position of being change-makers and having to stock up on cash, which, wasn't that a service a financial institution was supposed to provide?
I find it difficult to believe that businesspeople in all of these other parts of the world are unaware that they could make more money if they adopted the bigger-denominations-only rule. If they know this, and yet choose not to go that way, I can only think that they realize that it would also mean providing worse service to their customers. This is what we mean when we talk about values.
Also in Wellington, somebody told me that they had gone to a nice restaurant the first night, and at the end of the meal the hostess in the restaurant wrote out a list of other restaurants they should go to while they were in town. That a person can see more money available, and be okay with not getting it, is something that I always notice because I'm culturally inclined to expect the opposite. Or maybe I've just been going to the wrong restaurants.
I remember when I worked for a financial institution that had a number of ATMs, most of which dispensed US $20s, one of which dispensed $10 bills, and a few more of which gave both 20s and 5s. When these were replaced with newer models, they were all converted to give US $20 bills only. This was done for economic reasons, it being more efficient to deal in 1 denomination only. Also, being able to load up a machine with as much cash as possible increases the length of time it can handle transactions without needing anybody to come refill it. And I imagine it was to their benefit to have transactions for larger dollar amounts when it came to interchange income.
You know, it's an awfully useful thing sometimes to have 10s or 5s. Having only 20s available means that I often have to take out more than I need, to be sure of having enough, if that makes sense. It also means, when a group of people are out at a restaurant, and the bill comes and the only thing anyone has is 20s (also known as "paying with yuppie food stamps"), it means multiple subsequent calculations on how much everyone should get back. This puts restaurants and other businesses in the position of being change-makers and having to stock up on cash, which, wasn't that a service a financial institution was supposed to provide?
I find it difficult to believe that businesspeople in all of these other parts of the world are unaware that they could make more money if they adopted the bigger-denominations-only rule. If they know this, and yet choose not to go that way, I can only think that they realize that it would also mean providing worse service to their customers. This is what we mean when we talk about values.
Also in Wellington, somebody told me that they had gone to a nice restaurant the first night, and at the end of the meal the hostess in the restaurant wrote out a list of other restaurants they should go to while they were in town. That a person can see more money available, and be okay with not getting it, is something that I always notice because I'm culturally inclined to expect the opposite. Or maybe I've just been going to the wrong restaurants.
posted by Karen at 6:25 PM
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