Bosmans find 1c to pay account

2007-10-19 09:49

Philip de Bruin

Cape Town - There it was, in black and white, on the Edgars account. Fanie and Susan Bosman owed the chain store a princely R0.01.

But the clothing group had not bargained for the twinkle in the eyes of the Bosmans from Stellenberg in Cape Town: she is 70, and he is 75 years old. They set off to pay the account and in the process had the entire store in an uproar.

Susan said it all began when she went to pay an account for R53.41 at an Edgars branch.

"I asked the man at the cash register to round it off, meaning to 40c. But he rounded it off to 45c. I flatly refused and said no ways, I'm not paying 4c more than I should, so I paid R53.40.

"At the end of the month I got an account from Edgars for the outstanding amount of R0.01."

'Armed with the one cent, we set off'

But Edgars had not reckoned with "my mischievous husband".

He scratched around and found a 1c coin from 1961, the year South Africa first went decimal.

"Armed with this old cent we set off to Edgars. The girls behind the counter weren't even born when the coin was issued and they had no idea what to do with it. They eventually called in the manager's help.

"He took us off to his office, because people were starting to gather round us. He looked at the vintage coin from this angle and that and summarily declared it to be an official collector's item.

"My husband and I glanced at each other and Fanie said the man could keep the collector's item. At first he didn't want to, but later he did. And so we left there."

A spokesperson for Edgars' client services said Edgars would usually "ignore outstanding amounts of 1c, except if the matter was already in the hands of the lawyer."

Sarita van Wyk, Checkers corporate relations manager, said on enquiry that their group rounded off all cash payments downwards, in favour of the client.

"If the total is 44c, for instance, the cash registers automatically round it off to 40c, or 47c would be 45c. This only applies to cash transactions.

"As far as I know, all big chain stores use the exact same process of rounding off."

- Beeld