General Chat

I was a Saturday girl in a pharmacy/sub post office, and myself and the trainee pharmacist converted all the prices on the shelves. Like BrianW, we converted mentally by the end.

In my first job as a lowly articled clerk I got seconded to the department dealing with clients' investments at the time of decimalisation.

My task for quite a few weeks was to convert the figures in the ledgers from sterling to decimal for each investment.

It didn't take long for me to be able to do the conversion mentally without resorting to a a table and still can.

cos they ain't reel pennies, are they? a shillings worth of pennies was a real weight in the pocket!!!

What annoys me these days is people saying p instead of pence.

Remember the 1/2 pence, which was supposed to help keep prices in check?

It ended up costing more to produce than it's face value.

Exactly Bobtanian and for whats it is worth I think it was part of the plan anyway.

what annoyed me about decimalisation was the inevitable price increase due to conversion......and fuel to litres ...another rippoff

I also remember that when I started my last job, our end of year accounting was set to coincide with early April then the auditors used to check everything. It left a very tight margin to have the audited accounts ready for the AGM which seemed so silly to me.

Since 4/5 April was not legally binding as far as I could ascertain, I persuaded my place of work to change the financial end of year to 31 December - which they use to this day. It fitted in so much better.

My occupational pension goes into the bank on the 25th of the month. Also, for Direct Debits, the bank offers a choice of 3 dates, one of which is the 25th.

JoyLouise you reminded me. I started work for the Revenue just after decimalisation and after 5th April all employers had to submit their Paye returns. They were supposed to draw a line under Feb. and convert, but needless to say, most didn't. We did it for them.

Every year we had to balance the books down to the last penny, and because conversion wasn't exact, this was impossible. The number of taxpayers we had whose records were a penny out was incredible!

The boss of just about every office in the UK was asking Head Office for a special dispensation to write off these odd pence. We eventually got it, several months later and our lists of "arrears" suddenly disappeared!!

To this day commercial rents are paid Michelmas, Lent, Easter and , in normal times, in advance.
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The dates used by trad universities, all the other students have another 2 weeks per term.

The French Directoire after the revolution tried to decimalise both the calendar and clocks but it never really caught on.

“It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.”
G.O.

A blast from the past!

I want to ask whether anyone came across the use of Michaelmas Days for payments?

In my job leading to retirement, I was surprised to see that several entries from years ago (though still in the 20th century) revealed that a fair number of people had stuck to four quarterly payments around 25th/27th of the month.

At that time I was using my first skills set as an Office Manager for the finance company set up by two major banks and I was responsible, among other tasks, for the branch's ledger. (I changed tack completely in my middle years before coming full circle to use my early skills in my last job before I retired.)

The Branch Manager and I disagreed about how to handle ledgers. He thought I ought to enter every figure already converted to decimal currency. I believed I ought to carry on entering sterling, only decimalising the final monthly entry. He was my boss so, although I was responsible for all ledger entries, he carried the ultimate responsibility so his decisions took precedence over mine; I had no choice but I added that I was not going to be responsible for any shortfall at month's end - because I could see that was on the cards.

Come the end of the month when I'd totted all up, we were down. He was a bit nonplussed but he put his hand in his pocket and coughed up.

Among other responsibilities, regularly, I had to tell some applicants face-to-face that they could not have the loans they'd applied for. Some characters were what we'd call 'unsavoury' - one, in particular still springs to mind. My boss was probably hoping that because they were discussing things with a small, slim, short-skirted mid-20-year-old female they would not kick off. Wise move - the boss was right.

The worst I ever got were lies, denials and slightly raised tones of voice. I never got threatened, which surprised me because I knew the backgrounds of some applicants. I got many charm offensives from some men but I stood my ground of course - and developed a fairly thick skin at the same time.

Florence I so agree with your was only in my early 20s in 1973 but still can't get used to what I call the new way???? soon got used to using the money only because I had to use it every day but then would our children and grandchildren understand £ s d

When im baking, I still and always will work in ounces and pounds. Thats the way I was taught. When we went metric, I hated it as an ounce wasnt/isnt an exact conversion. Same with cm/inches. 2.5 cm to one inch.

I still talk in feet and inches when measuring curtains. When asked my height at the hospital, I said well I have been 5ft 4 for years but it says 161 cm on my passport!
Allan, i still say for chicken/turkey etc 20 mins per pound plus 20 minutes.20 mins per 1/2 a kilo doesnt have the same ring does it?

Seeing as we are not in the EU anymore, are we now allowed to ask for a pound of bacon instead of 1/2 kilo?

Florence in the hebrides

I'd had a split mind about metric for many years we went metric in measurements in 1970 over here ...............

I was a science student from high school, so from then on I used metric in the lab, including saying the fridge should be 3-5C

At home, I used imperial for everything. including the temperature in the fridge.

I switched automatically as I moved between home and work.

Then Canada converted, and I found it a bit hard to convert at home! However I got used to it, now I don't use anything but metric, not even for temperature except when posting on a UK site.

I notice that a lot of people have found it hard, and there are also deliberate resisters ............ meat for example is still shown on display tags as price per lb, with price per kg in lower case, but the sales receipt will show the weight as gram or kilogram. That's because people have complained so often about not seeing the Imperial measurement!

The other strange thing is that manufacturers refused to change the size of containers to metric.

So, we buy milk as 1.89 litres .............. that used to be the 4 pint size. 2 l would be easier as a measurement, but the box wouldn't fit existing machinery, containers, etc etc.

However, we've always had a problem here with metric because we have an open border with the US, who are stubbornly metric, but not Imperial measurements either although the use the same words.

A US gallon is smaller than the Imperial gallon etc.


and we still use cups, tsps, tbsps, etc in recipes :-D

Hubby wanted to buy some tools for his new job and ask for a 6 inch imperial rule and a 12 inch metric rule :-( the irony was that the sales assistant knew what he meant and got them for him.

Mr Owl doesn’t use cm at all. He just uses metres and millimetres :-D

What can I say the building industry is a different planet. They talk about needing a piece of 8’ by 4’ 10mm thick.

Ironically, I still convert back to imperial when roasting meat as that how I was first taught eg 20 mins. per pound and 20 mins over

OH just uses metric :-D

Human stupidity is in the ascendency.

vultus inter