An Armourer's Perspective questions

[Alan de Enfield]

Peter, sadly I am old enough to remember the 'old currency'. I was about thirteen or fourteen when the change over occurred.

15th Feb 1971 - a 'dark day' indeed !

2.4d = 1p

No more 'Jenny Wrens', 'Joeys', 'tanners', 'bobs', florins', 'half-a-dollar' (half-a-crown) or a 'dollar', no more Guinea's (although horses are sold in Guineas)

The smallest denomination coin I have in my collection is a 1/2 Farthing (1/2880 of a pound)

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[bombdoc]

15th Feb 1971 - a 'dark day' indeed !

Indeed.. my wife was working in the Bank of England at the time, and she always said that the word in the bank was that they decimalised wrong thing. Instead of changing the value of the penny, they should have changed the value of the pound to match 100 pennies. We ended up with one of the highest value, low end coins in the world at the time, and when inflation kicked in, prices went up 2.4 times higher that they needed to. In other words, instead of retailers adding 1d to the price of something, they added 1p, or 2.4d!

The reason they decimalised the penny was purely political... (so no change there then!)

To those of you who moan about having worthless small denomination coin, be careful! There is a value in having a low denomination minimal value coin when inflation is about!

[Bindi2]

Indeed.. my wife was working in the Bank of England at the time, and she always said that the word in the bank was that they decimalised wrong thing. Instead of changing the value of the penny, they should have changed the value of the pound to match 100 pennies. We ended up with one of the highest value, low end coins in the world at the time, and when inflation kicked in, prices went up 2.4 times higher that they needed to. In other words, instead of retailers adding 1d to the price of something, they added 1p, or 2.4d!

The reason they decimalised the penny was purely political... (so no change there then!)

To those of you who moan about having worthless small denomination coin, be careful! There is a value in having a low denomination minimal value coin when inflation is about!

very correct. The 1 and 2 cent coins have been axed in OZZIE and the 5 cent is not looking good. Advised price and rounding up for cash is common.