Stands equal chance...

“A painter should begin every canvas with a wash of black, because all things in nature are dark except where exposed by the light.” - Leonardo da Vinci

I saw a memo submitted by Malaysian Retailers Association to the Ministry to address the perceived shortages of 1 sen coins. The fact is that shortage problem would be compounded once GST/VAT is implemented in 2007. Malaysia like Singapore or New Zealand, could live without the 1 sen coins. Moreover, it costs more than 1 sen to mint each 1 sen coin.

Someone should look at the suggestion to legalize rounding of prices to nearest 5 sen for cash transactions. The proposal is to round down in consumers’ favor if the final tally contains 1 sen, 2 sen, 6 sen or 7 sen and rounding up in the retailers’ favor if the final sum contains 3 sen, 4 sen, 8 sen and 9 sen. Both the customer and retailers stand an equal chance of gaining or losing a maximum of 2 sen on each transaction while using one sen pricing for all goods and services.

Personally, I seldom take the 1 sen change from the cashier. For some retailers, to place a charity box next to the cashier’s counter is a noble idea. At least an avenue for the retailers to exchange the 1 sen with other denominations and reuse the 1 sen for their transactions and for consumers to donate their 1 sen and niat as sedekah…