The Royal Canadian Mint is releasing new loonies and toonies made out
of steel instead of nickel and copper in an effort to cut down cost. "What that gives the tax payer, basically, is a savings…an annual
savings of up to $15 million a year," explained Alex Reeves from the
Mint. For some businesses, though, the coins will mean an extra expense.
Colin Stone owns a vending machine business. He said the new coins mean
upgrades for the thousands of machines he supplies or maintains in
Winnipeg. "The new coin will have a new, magnetic signature on it," he said.
"So we'll have to just reprogram all of the acceptors to take and accept
the new coins." Those upgrades will cost the vending machine industry around $40 million across the country. Those in the industry describe the changes as cutthroat and say the
time it will take to reprogram the machines can make or break a
business. The old loonies and toonies will remain in circulation and will work in vending and parking machines.
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Don Quixote Note: These new coins will not be accepted by the parking meters we have in Vernon. In this years budget we will have to approve a $77,000 cost for upgrading our existing parking meters to accept the new Loonies and toonies. (this is a 77,000/241,792 = .32% tax increase.
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