On September 13, the Bank of England will unveil the 15 per cent smaller, stronger and cleaner £5 note.
The note does pose a potential disruption to the gaming industry with a possible 200,000 machines needing to be calibrated to accept the new bill. Aidan Towey, managing director at Innovative Technology, which specialises in cash handling technology, said: “About 60 per cent are all sorted. There’s equipment out there that’s quite old. A lot of the people have taken note of what we’ve have been saying and which machines will be able to be updated.”
Towey believes that operators who have planned ahead will see few problems on the 13th but feels “the smaller ones won’t do anything” until the note hits, at which point he expects a spike in demand for equipment and data sets.
“It’s amazing; no matter what we put in the press, no matter what Bank of England does to tell people about the change, until someone actually gets one into their hands they won’t realise the machines won’t be able to take it,” he continued.
This may act as a wake-up call for operators, meaning less of a disruption when the £10 polymer note featuring Jane Austen is released in May 2017. “If it’s coming out in May we’ll probably have it in our units by February/March time and it’ll be ready to be updated from then on,” said Towey.
