Verbalism Personified: Of plastic notes and crashing ATMs

Thursday, May 06, 2004

Of plastic notes and crashing ATMs

When the Monetary Authority of Singapore released new $10 polymer notes for circulation on Tue 4 May 2004, people hardly noticed. I suppose that was a good thing.

The Straits Times reported the following day, that this was exactly the response MAS was hoping for after an unsuccessful attempt to introduce $50 polymer notes 14 years earlier. The absence of frenzied masses clamoring for these smooth-as-silk red notes would 'allow banks and business to fine tune their machines' and phase in the new notes.

Retaining the current Yusof Ishak design, the new note features two see-through windows and a new signature - that of current MAS Chairman, Mr. Lee Hsien Loong, a post previously held by Dr. Richard Hu. A check with the MAS specifications revealed new security features that would make them harder to forge using color copiers, scanners and printers.

Looking back, the $50 dollar polymer was a big thing when it was launched in 1990. While being harder to forge, these little beauties also made for richer-looking currency and lasted longer than their paper cousins.

However MAS quickly pulled them from circulation on the account that the polymers were sticky and harder to fold. Thus, the official line went, ATMs couldn't dispense them and currency feeders couldn't read them.

Incidently, the Reserve Bank of Australia began circulating polymers of $5s, $10s and $20s two years earlier. And if any of you remembered the clanking iron-lip ATM machines used by POSBank, these were the same exact ATMs used by banks Down Under. And they were dispensing my slick polymer Aussies with nary a hitch!

Well upgrade the ATMs! Use MacOS X, UNIX, Linux or even Windows XP if you have to! Fix it so that it won't crash on me whenever I want my polymer! Because a world-class city dispensing world-class currency from a world-class ATM is all part of the world-class experience.

A concurrent ST poll revealed that 75% of respondents "liked the look and feel of the new notes" and that "polymer was the way to go." So MAS, are you listening?

This time however, efforts by SMRT and other business organizations in re-calibrating their currency feeders may be the signal that polymer notes are here to stay. So far from being a material of choice by some banana republic, MAS is making the right decision in adopting polymer-based currency. As Singapore's economy powers into the 21st century, this will add one more notch to its credentials as a world-class city.