Is it time to ditch the penny?

j.e.j.

I still remember half-pennies :rotfl: A lot of things used to be priced at 99-and-a-half p!

SailorSam

queenmedusa wrote: »

My friend cashed the contents of his giant vodka bottle and it came to over £300!

Wow is that what i'm going to have in my whiskey bottle something like that, i was going to give it to the Sally Army woman, not so sure now.

MarkLS12

liz545 wrote: »

You need to have a lowest value coin, and it makes most sense in a metric system for that to be 1, surely?

It does not make sense to keep producing a coin when it costs more to make the coin than it is worth.

New Zealand has the 10cent as its smallest coin.
In Denmark 50 cents is the smallest.

HappyMJ

And some things become cheaper. A common price point is 99p. Most will instead of pricing things at 99p will start pricing at 95p rather than £1. This isn't so likely in supermarkets but more likely in take away outlets. The prices won't change in supermarkets.

When it takes 10 seconds to earn 1 penny and about half that time to spend it and also hand it over in change then it isn't even worth using it as change any more. A higher throughput of customers will increase turnover and help cut costs (per transaction) and those cuts are passed onto customers.

My vote is to get rid of 1's and 2's.

whitewing

SailorSam wrote: »

Wow is that what i'm going to have in my whiskey bottle something like that, i was going to give it to the Sally Army woman, not so sure now.

Years ago my friend bought a new washing machine with the contents of her coppers jar. Count it before you give it, even if only to be sure you gift aid it if you can.

karlie88

I bought a bag of sweets from Tesco earlier for 1p...that's enough proof to keep the coppers.

lutzi1

See a penny, pick it up, and all the day you'll have good luck.

luxor4t

lutzi1 wrote: »

See a penny, pick it up, and all the day you'll have good luck.

... and all the day you'll have a penny to put into the collection! See below for how much I've picked up this year.

Being on the second year of a wage freeze, the thought of prices jumping by 1% (if the 1p coin goes) is worrying.

I can remember the prices jumping when decimalization was introduced ... none of the 'rounding up of the total' in shops then, eveything rose individually and nothing was cheaper.

MarkLS12

luxor4t wrote: »

Being on the second year of a wage freeze, the thought of prices jumping by 1% (if the 1p coin goes) is worrying.

I can remember the prices jumping when decimalization was introduced ... none of the 'rounding up of the total' in shops then, eveything rose individually and nothing was cheaper.

Decimalization was a totally different thing.
It was a change from having 240 pennies in a pound to having 100 so every individual price which did not end 0d or 6d had to change.

Having 5p as the lowest coin does not require the price of anything to change.
In transactions like direct debits, credit cards and debit cards there would be no difference whatsoever, they would still be charged to the nearest penny.
There would only be a change for cash payments.

Canny Money Savers could use it to save a few pence.
If the bill is £20.93 pay £20.93 by card (instead of 20.95 cash)
If the bill is £20.92 pay £20.90 cash (instead of £20.92 by card)

JimmyTheWig

It doesn't make sense to scrap the 1p without scrapping the 2p and/or the 5p. Every coin needs to be a multiple of the lowest value coin.
Otherwise, if you needed to pay 10p and had a 5p and three 2ps, what change would you get?
I'm voting to keep them all for now, at least.

Oraged wrote: »

even the supermarket self service kiosks try to offload them onto customers as change.

I've never experienced this. I've found they always give change in the most efficient way, even if I've used a load of coppers to pay.

liz545 wrote: »

You need to have a lowest value coin, and it makes most sense in a metric system for that to be 1, surely?

Are you suggesting that we should revalue the currency to make the 1p worthwhile? Interesting!