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Abu Dhabi: They are hardly used in banks, grocery stores, currency exchange offices and taxis, but officially they are still legal tender.
The 1 fil, 5 fil and 10 fil coins are outdated coins that, in most cases, cost more to produce than their face value. Inflation has chipped away the value of the copper-rich coins, making them a nuisance and a burden.
Their uselessness in everyday life leaves these coins in ashtrays and bowls, dropped in some donation boxes at stores or pocketed by tourists as souvenirs. "Keep the change," you tell the cashier, not out of kindness, but to get rid of useless change in your pocket.
Stamped on the 1 fil coin is a palm tree, which was first minted in 1973. The Gulf's biggest catch, the Hammour, is embossed on the 5 fil coin with these words written around it: "Cleanliness of the sea means more nourishment to the public." The 10 fil coin bears a dhow in full sail.
Adjusting prices
Major supermarkets in the UAE have adjusted their prices to the nearest quarter of a dirham to avoid the use of insignificant change. However, weighted items such as groceries and fruit are calculated at every fil.
Inflation have made these coins useless in everyday life. Even Abu Dhabi's old taxis run in fractions of 50 fils, rendering such small coins useless. Although the new taxis count every fil, they are usually rounded off to 25 fils when paying.
"We try to round off our prices to the nearest quarter just to make it easier for the consumer," said a spokesperson for Spinneys, "but at the end of the day rounding off means either a loss for us or for the customer ... we are still using the 1 fil [coins], but it's not very common."
There were days when carrying the fils around was worth all the weight and jiggling in the pockets.
Cleyton Miranda still remembers the days when Dh1 could buy you a breakfast. "You could buy tea and bread with just Dh1," laughed the 25-year resident of Abu Dhabi.
"There was a point in carrying change in your pocket then, but today they are hardly used anywhere else other than Abu Dhabi Cooperative Society." he said.
The Coop has actually cancelled their use of 1 fil coins and adjusted their prices. "We haven't used the 1 fil for a very long time. If necessary we round off our prices to the lowest 5 fils," Bijoy Thomas, promotions and marketing manager at the Coop said.
With hundreds of thousands of transactions a day, this could mean a great loss for the Coop, but Thomas said: "The providers have also adjusted their prices so that the 1 fil could be avoided."
Thousands of miles from the UAE, in Canada's winter wonderland city of Winnipeg, the UAE coins are minted and then shipped to the Central Bank. Minted by the world's largest coin manufacturers, the Royal Canadian Mint (RCM), the 1 fil, 5 fils, and 10 fils coins are made of some of the finest metals.
According to the Central Bank, the 1 fil, 5 fils and 10 fils coins are made of 97 per cent copper, 2.5 per cent zinc and 0.5 per cent tin.
"Today, copper has become a precious metal of sorts which would make most of these coins, especially the 1 fil [coins], far costlier than their face value," said Rashid Al Fandy, Executive Director of Banking Operations at the Central Bank.
Despite their scant relevance, the Central Bank said you'd better find a use for these coins because they are not going to vanish any time soon.
With more than 490 million UAE coins in circulation, they are likely to stay around for awhile.
However, today's economy makes it virtually impossible to buy things for Dh1 let alone 1 fil. With the high price of copper, not even the Central Bank can buy 1 fil coins for 1 fil.
"The price increase in today's goods has made these coins less usable but they are still legal tender," Al Fandi said. Although the circulation of the 50 fil and Dh1 coins makes about 90 per cent of all coins out there, the Central Bank still produces their lower denominators.
In 2005 the UAE bought eight million 5 fil coins and eight million 10 fil coins from RCM. Although the 1 fil coins are still legal tender, they were not purchased in the last order.
"We haven't produced 1 fil [coins] for more than seven years ... because their value is too low and there is no demand for them ... and I can't say we have it in our plans to purchase them, but they are still used," Al Fandy said.
In countries like Canada and the United States melting copper has become an increasingly popular get-rich-quick scheme.
Coins and copper wire were melted and sold on the black market in large quantities. The value of copper is Dh14 per pound, which means that a 1 fil coin is worth double its face value.
Diameter
- 10 fils: 19mm in diameter and weighs 3gm
- 5 fils: 17mm in diameter and weighs 2.20gm
- 1 fil: 15mm in diameter and weighs 1.50gm
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