Emilia Vexler
02/29/2020 - 9:52
- Clarín.com
- Society
The era of $ 5 bills comes to an end. This Saturday, February 29 is the last day to use them in the street. They can then be deposited or redeemed in banks until March 31. There is no greater mystery. But the "unimaginable", it seems, is that Chinese shops and supermarkets accept them during their last hours of legal tender. Not that customers want to eject them from their wallets.
The main reason for the rejection: the merchants say that the banks usually do not have coins and fear they will not receive enough when they go to change the stack of $ 5 bills.
"Today (by Friday) customers come and revoke us the $ 5 bills. We have to receive them, when there are not enough coins to replace them. The 10-cent coins nobody wants, the 25 and 50 you don't see them anymore and you have to look for them with a magnifying glass at $ 5. This generates a shudder in the box, "says Clarín Yolanda Durán, president of CEDEAPSA, the camera that brings together Chinese supermarkets.
"They come and tell you: 'They are legal tender, you have to accept them.' As with anger, when we go to the bank afterwards and they never have coins. Hopefully the government will extend the deadline for 15 days, so that we can also fall apart of these tickets and not create as much friction with customers, "he adds.
Although the Argentine Chamber of Commerce and the Argentine Chamber of Medium Enterprises (CAME) had originally requested that the circulation exit be postponed for six months, the extension was more meager and the greens with the face of San Martín had only a few More weeks of grace.
The initial deadline was February 1. In mid-January it was extended by the end of that month. In addition, the BCRA gave 30 more days to change banknotes: it will now be possible until March 31.
But, as retailers explain, the extension was not enough. It is not least to remember that by law businesses must round down.
According to information from the Central Bank of the Argentine Republic (BCRA) as of February 14 there were 411 million $ 5 bills and 138 million coins. That is, the ratio is almost 3 to 1 between them. A month ago, when the entity decided to postpone the withdrawal, the distance was even greater. There were 460 million bills and 94 million coins. Almost 5 to 1.
According to the Central Bank, as of February 14, there were 3 $ 5 bills in circulation for every 1 coin of the same value. (Photo: BCRA)
From the Union of Kiosqueros of the Argentine Republic (UKRA), they are still waiting for a response to the request for extension they presented last week.
"They did not answer us from the National State. From Santa Fe to Jujuy, in all the northern provinces, the $ 5 coins did not arrive, they did not supply the distribution. The bank tells you that it has no coins and those $ bills 5, that pile that we carry, it might come back in other bills. It does not work for us. The same happened when they took out the $ 2. In the kiosks the change is very necessary and it is an unease to deal with customers, "he tells Clarín Néstor Adrián Palacios, president of that union.
Nationally there are about 80 thousand "shops of proximity", which, in addition to the kiosks, includes warehouses, rotisseries and butchers.
Thus, "even more in the interior," he says, Palacios gives more details of the "small discussions" that are also heard in the boxes of the City and Greater Buenos Aires. "It is something cultural of Argentina," he says, "that the consumer first discards the $ 5 bill in the shops and at the time of receiving the return he does not want to accept it. The bank then has no coins. On one side and the other, there should be no such inconvenience. "