Vocal Voices

Looking through the newspaper supplement on Cruises, I notice that most of them are listed at
prices such as "Only £1,999". Are people really influenced by this method?, and would trade
really fall if £2000 was quoted? I think it is insulting the intelligence of people.

I can see that there is some sense in shops pricing small items at, say, 99p, as this will require the
assistant to do the necessary operation at the till and give the 1p change, otherwise the customer
might just hand over a £1 coin and depart, giving a dishonest assistant opportunity to pocket the £1.

I see that furniture suppliers also use the tactic of pricing things at, say, £199. Does it really fool people?

What do you think?

We would always round that up to 2,000 if talking about it, and in the case of a cruise specifically, it ignores the the fact that (a) you will have to scrutinise very carefully to find the one cruise available at that price, probably being told that it is no longer available and (2) the various charges that will immediately bring it up to well over 2,000. I am amazed that people still fall for it

It is quite amazing just how much people do still fall for it though Aggers. Take a £199 purchase for example - people will think they're getting a bargain because said item is less that £200... but if it were say £201 it goes to 'oh, it's over £200" and it would make people think. Despite there only being a £2 difference in the two...

As for the 99p things in shops, that I don't quite agree with you. Most stores now-a-days scan items they sell and those scans in turn tally the stock levels and should tie in with money taken in, so not much chance for anyone to pocket money. It could potentially happen in smaller local stores / newsagents but most of those are run by their owners so they'd have little reason to pocket anything.

Personally I'd be very much in favour of 1p and 2p coins being phased out... although I suspect many charities would suffer loads if that did happen?

I'd like to see the smaller coins phased out too Ria, I hate the tiny 5p we have now and a lot of the self service tills seem to give them out as change rather than 10p and 20p coins.

It's just the power of suggestion Aggers, people see the first figure ie the £1 and no matter that the following figures mean only a saving of a few pence it still looks a lot less than £2,000........