Empirical Studies on Cash Payments

Cash is still the most common means of daily payments. The large number of cash payments is supported by a costly distribution system in which retailers, banks and central banks participate. Currency is issued in a range of bank note and coin denominations to facilitate efficiency in cash payments. The purpose of this thesis is to study the performance of a currency range in practice. It presents a number of empirical studies on cash payments at the individual payment level, whereby cash payments are viewed as the outcome of a choice process. This type of analysis calls for labor-intensive data collection methods and the development of a sophisticated econometric model. This thesis introduces such a model for cash payments, and it reviews its application to three unique data sets of cash payments. The data concern payments in the Netherlands before and after the transition from the guilder to the euro in 2002, and payments in an experimental setting. The estimation results allow for an assessment of the use of different bank note and coin denominations in cash payments, and of possible preferences for one of more denominations. Currency research generally approaches currency use from a macroeconomic point of view. The novelty of this thesis is that it contributes to currency research by focusing on individual cash payments.Jeanine Kippers (1973) obtained her master´s degree in econometrics from the Erasmus University Rotterdam in 1997. In the same year she was employed by De Nederlandsche Bank. She participated in the preparations of the cash changeover from guilder to euro in 2002, and contributed to the development of a European cash distribution system and the restructuring of the national distribution system. During her employment at the central bank she started her research on currency use, which resulted in several papers that have been published or are currently under review. In January 2004 she joined the Pensionand Insurance Supervisory authority, as a policy advisor in the (international) field of insurance supervision

How do we pay with euro notes? Empirical evidence from Monopoly experiments

In contrast to abundant theoretical literature, there are almost no empirical studies on how individuals actually deal with cash. In this paper we analyze euro transactions, made during various games of Monopoly® (European edition), where in some games we deliberately left out one of the notes. We find that not having access to 100-euro or 10-euo notes is not as problematic for payment behavior as it is for not having 200-euro and 20-euro not

An empirical analysis of euro cash payments

If the denominational structure of the euro is used in an optimal way, there should be no preferences for using certain coins and notes. In Kippers et al. (2003) it is documented that the Dutch public did have certain preferences concernin

Do we need all Euro denominations?

We show that there are theoretical arguments, which indicate that leaving out the 1-euro cent and 2-euro cent leads to more efficient cash payment behavior. Next, we show that having no access to 100-euro notes and 10-euro notes is less harmful than having no 50-euro notes. Finally, we argue that the transition from the Dutch guilder to the euro should not have led to different payment behavior, at least in theory

Hoe betalen we eigenlijk?

Het is voor sommige mensen nog even wennen, die euro. In het Duitse Erbach bleek een pompbediende nog niet helemaal op de hoogte van de nieuwe biljetten. Een klant rekende daar af met een biljet van 300 euro. Netjes kreeg hij vervolgens 250 euro terug

Meer betaalgemak door de euro.

De euro geeft meer betaalgemak dan de gulden. Empirisch onderzoek laat zien dat Nederlanders efficiënter dan in het guldentijdperk betalen met de reeks van eurobiljetten en -munten. Ook heeft men - in tegenstelling tot de gulden - geen sterke voorkeur voor bepaalde coupures

An Empirical Study of Cash Payments

Anytime an individual makes a cash payment, s/he needs to think about the amount to be paid, the coins and notes which are available, and the amount of change. For central banks and retail stores, for example, it is of interest to un- derstand how this individual choice process works. The literature of currency use concerns primarily theory, in the sense that, given certain assumptions, one can de- rive an optimal denomination range. There is no empirical study which deals with the actual use of coins and notes, given a specific denomination range. In this paper we therefore present such a study, which is based on two rather unique data sets. We use descriptive statistics and a sophisticated model, which is designed for this specific purpose, to see whether two basic premises of the theories on optimal ranges are valid. In contrast to the widely accepted assumptions, we find that individuals appear not to pay efficiently and that they are also not indifferent to the use of coins and notes. In other words, some notes and coins are used less often than expected given the payment situation