Retailers complain about the lack of coins for change
The experts complain about shortage of exchange coins in retail chains.
On October 30 the representatives of the National Bank of the Republic of Kazakhstan, the second-tier banks held a meeting on the platform of the Atameken National Chamber of Entrepreneurs. The agenda of the meeting included the shortage of exchange coins in retail chains. Shortage of coins with value from 5 to 100 tenge is confirmed by the representatives of the financial sector.
In addition, the shortage of exchange coins has become a significant barrier to the development of retail trade in Kazakhstan. Trading networks Magnum Cash&Carry, Small, Anvar and other business entities also complain about this problem. The inability to give the buyer change for the purchased goods causes not only certain reputational risks, but also the loss of time resources of employees working at the cash desk.
"The country is in a terrible situation with small coins for change, not only in large and medium-sized businesses, which use encashment and receive less coins from banks, but also in small businesses, even from sellers on the market," Dmitriy Shishkin wrote on Facebook in May 2019. (link)
Citizens of Kazakhstan complained that due to the lack of change, sellers are asking to change money, pay using cards, the shops warn about the lack of coins. This problem remained unresolved and in August 2019, the Magnum retail chain complained to Atameken that second-tier banks were unable to satisfy the supply of exchangeable coins worth 200 million tenge, and the shortage of coins created a significant barrier to retail development in Kazakhstan.
"Atameken brought together representatives of the National Bank, second-tier banks, Associations of Financiers of Kazakhstan representatives of retail chains: Anvar, Magnum, Metro, Meloman, Mon Amie, as well as entrepreneurs from the regions.
Businessmen complain that they have to look for coins where possible, from ATMs and gaming machines, negotiate with them and exchange them.
"We take out the little things we can, exchange them from taxis, mosques and ATMs. We can't work like an endless vacuum cleaner. Here we voice this problem and want to understand what is required of business to solve it. We want to hear proposals from the National Bank," commented on the situation of retailers.
Representatives of the National Bank of Kazakhstan commented on the situation from their side.
"The amount of coins in circulation today is 49,436,363,980 tenge. The dynamics of issue and withdrawal of circulation coins from circulation in recent years show that there is a stable trend to reduce the return of coins to the cash offices of branches of the National Bank. At the same time, one can observe a tendency to reduce the volume of withdrawal of circulation coins. In the first nine months of 2019, the total volume of circulation coins was 5.2 billion tenge. At the same time, the amount of withdrawal of coins from circulation was only 542.8 million tenge, or 11.0% of the volume of issue," Acting Director of the Cash Circulation Department of the National Bank of Kazakhstan Zhomart Kazhmuratov said.
That is, with virtually the same number of issued coins for the period from 2009 to the current period, the number of return of these coins from the turnover of these coins is decreasing every year. What are the reasons for this decline?
One of the assumptions of the National Bank is that the coins are deposited in terminals, slot machines and other machines, partially with the population. In addition, it is impossible to deny the increasing role of cashless settlement in trade transactions. It is not excluded as a variant of solving the problem and reconsidering the needs of the regions, with subsequent redistribution of funds. Therefore, to find out the possible reasons, the participants decided to analyze the situation in the regions for the second tier banks.
Also, the National Bank believes that the situation will be saved by the issue of coins denomination of 200 tenge at the end of this year.
"The planned volume of circulating coins in circulation with the value of 200 tenge is 26% of the total amount of circulating coins in circulation," Zhomart Tulegenovich said.
He also specified that the National Bank plans to issue additional coins for more than 3 billion tenge. Distribution of coins of the additional issue will be made taking into account the needs of individual regions.
Summing up the results of the meeting, the Atameken and the meeting participants agreed to take control of the situation, prepare analysis and propose alternative solutions.
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