“NO SALES IMPACT”
The first renewal of paper money since 2004 spurred businesses to upgrade payment machines for cash-loving customers.
Although cashless payments in Japan have almost tripled over the past decade to make up 39 per cent of consumer spending in 2023, that share lags global peers and should rise to as high as 80 per cent to improve productivity, the government says.
Roughly 90 per cent of bank ATMs, train ticket machines and retail cash registers are prepared to accept new bills, but only half of restaurant and parking ticket machines are ready, the Japan Vending Machine Manufacturers Association says.
Nearly 80 per cent of 2.2 million drink vending machines nationwide also need upgrades, it added.
“It might take until year-end to respond to this,” said Takemori Kawanami, an executive at ticket machine company Elcom. “That’s too slow, but we are short of components,” he added, as client orders for upgrades exceeded expectations.
Many Japanese fast-food restaurants such as ramen shops and beef bowl stores rely on ticket machines to cut labour costs, but some small business owners battling inflation are unhappy with the extra investment the new bills entail.
“The machine replacement has no sales impact, so it’s only negative for us, on top of rising costs of labour and ingredients,” said Shintaro Sekiguchi, who spent about 600,000 yen for ticket machines at three ramen shops he runs in southern Tokyo.
As cashless payments grow, Sekiguchi hankered for a cutting-edge machine that could offer clients various payment options, but could only afford cash-only equipment.
“Our ramen doesn’t have high unit prices, so running the shop for a day or two would hardly pay for the replacement,” he added.
Source link : https://www.channelnewsasia.com/east-asia/japan-new-banknotes-yen-holograms-counterfeits-cash-4453516
Author :
Publish date : 2024-07-02 20:53:02
Copyright for syndicated content belongs to the linked Source.
