New coins

The blame game begins as the headline says “BNM faults autopay vendors”. At the moment, machines that uses coins will still accept old coins but not the new ones as they have not been recalibrated to accept the new coins launched from 16 January 2012. The Bank Negara said they had given operators and vendors of autopay machines more than six months to upgrade to accept the recently introduced new coins. Meanwhile, the Malaysian Association for Shopping and Highrise Complex Management president, H.C. Chan said the authorities had not informed them about the need to upgrade the machines.

Who is right? Even if Bank Negara had given notice a year ago, should not the onus be on the authorities to ensure that most machines have been recalibrated before the launch? The public are not against the new coins but when so much of our daily lives involves machines and coins, a more effective implementation of the ruling would be beneficial to everyone. A much more thorough and smoother process to ease the transition to the new coins is missing. As it is, there will be grumbles and frustrations adding unnecessary stress on ourselves. The authorities have the experience and expertise to make this exercise painless but the reality is not following their script.

People First, Performance Now?

Image from nbc