The new 50,000-won banknote is under fire for a defect which, as shown in the photo, is prone to split. Consumer complaints fell on deaf ears, with officials saying that the defect is not serious enough to pose inconveniences to the bill’s use. / Korea Times |
 By Kim Tong-hyung
Staff Reporter
When it comes to market principles, the Bank of Korea, the country's central bank, appears to act above it. The case in point is its just-introduced 50,000-won notes.
The bank is the monopoly in currency printing through its subordinate Korea Minting andSecurity Printing Corp. (KOMSCO). In responding to consumer grievances about the bill's quality, BOK says that it sees no problem.
The approach is triggering an outrage among consumers and merchants.
First, the bright orange bills with a gray Sin Saimdang bust in the middle won't be winning any aesthetic contests, and consumers are complaining that they are too similar to the existing 5,000-won bills in color and design.
The quality of the new notes also raises questions when the bills are literally falling apart, exposing a weak spot.
``I haven't received a 50,000-won bill from a passenger yet, but the thought disturbs me, as it will take very long to count the change and severely drain my float,'' said Seok Sang-hoon, a Seoul taxi driver.
``At night, I think I will have trouble telling the difference between a 50,000-won bill and 5,000 won under dim light and that will be kind of annoying.''
Seok has yet to touch a 50,000-won bill, but probably won't be getting a lot of positive reviews from those who did. Lee Sung-yeon, who owns a coffee shop in Hyehwa-dong, downtown Seoul, is worried about having her employees carry more cash on deliveries in case someone decides to use a 50,000-won bill for a trio of mocha lattes.
``It's the same for Chinese food delivery services, street snack vendors and supermarkets. The 50,000-won bills will be welcomed at department stores and clothing shops, but not as much with us,'' she said.
According to the Bank of Korea, the total of 50,000-won bills withdrawn at the central bank and other financial organizations was valued at over 1.6 trillion won on Tuesday, the first day of the release.
However, the message boards of the BOK Web site are now overflowing with unflattering comments that show the excitement over the new bills is being quickly replaced with frustration.
``We already have trouble telling the difference between the 10,000-won bills and the new 1,000-won bills at night. Now we will have the same problem with the 50,000-won bills and 5,000-won bills,'' read one of the posts.
Another Internet user suggested that BOK should consider redesigning the 50,000-won bill, including changing the spot of the printed numbers to make them more easily distinguishable from the 5,000 won notes.
The idea of debuting the bills was all about encouraging consumer spending, and the market for banknote detectors, used for scanning counterfeit money, is contributing its own part.
The sales of portable detectors at Auction (www.auction.co.kr), the country's biggest online shopping destination, have more than tripled since the release of the 50,000-won bills, the company said. Most of the clients are shop owners, restaurants and taxi drivers who handle cash frequently. There are more than 10 banknote detectors sold locally, Auction said, with the prices ranging from 10,000 won to 150,000 won.
There are a lot of complaints about the look of the new banknotes, but a bigger problem could be the quality of the bills, which are seeing design flaws exposed.
As with other Korean bills, the 50,000-won note is equipped with a visible, metal-coated thread as one of its security measures to prevent forgery. However, the security thread isn't properly embedded into the bill, with the thread easily detached from the paper by peeling the edges of the ridge.
BOK says that the splitting seams aren't a serious issue, but an official from a company producing automated teller machines (ATMs) said that the bills could cause potential problems in cash machines.
``There is a problem that foreign substances could go into the gap created by the detached security thread, which could make the bills thicker. This could disturb bill detection,'' he said.
``If the threads easily fall off, that will be a problem as well and all these may add up to jam the machines. I think they should have come up with a better banknote.''
BOK maintains that there is no flaw in the design of the 50,000-won bills, claiming that they already knew about the detaching threads, which obviously makes its decision to release the banknotes the way they were all the more confusing.
The bank insists that there will be no problem in using the new banknotes in ATMs and other cash machines, saying that no problems have emerged from tests by KOMSCO.
But it was found that two ATM makers that participated in the test of the new banknotes suggested redesigning the bills, an opinion that was reported to BOK.
However, BOK officials decided that no improvements were needed, and critics are now wondering whether the central bank was pushing things too hard to meet the target release date.
``We didn't use glue to attach the security threads to the paper to maximize the visual effectiveness of the moving hologram stripes,'' said Lee Nae-hwang, who directs the BOK currency issue department.
``We have used security stripes in 1,000 won bills as well, and there haven't been any problems with ATMs.''
thkim@koreatimes.co.kr
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