99P, £1.99, £29.99. Is it just the UK that sells items ending in 99P? Why dont sellers just round it up.

Question

We all know that 99p means a £1.00 etc...surely it would be easier to round up items for sale to the nearest pound. I know in Greece they dont do this.

Answer 1

It is quite irritating. Who wants dozens of pennies clogging up their purse?

Answer 2

they just think that when you see 99p instead of £1.01 it seems like a deal, basically idoits think they are getting a bargain!!

Answer 3

The reason they do it is because even though it is only 1 cent or 1 pence difference in peoples minds it's sounds cheaper than if it were rounding up.

Paula

http://www.squidoo.com/make-money-online...

Answer 4

yhh i think its stupid .. they proberly do it because £0.99p sounds alot less than £1.00 when its not! x

Answer 5

omg i always think that ! it's so annoying & pointless. plus you always have basically worthless & ugly pennies in your purse! x

Answer 6

This is a selling tactic that goes back to the days when cash registers were first used in the US.  The initial reason was to make sure that employees processed all goods and didn't pocket the money - they would have to ring the item up to give the penny change.

Of course, an unexpected benefit of this was the psychological benefit of people believing the item was a little less that it actually was and this practice still exists today.  Nowadays, stores are going for the 98p or 97p options in an attempt to give them the edge over their competitors.

Answer 7

99p sounds less than £1.00 or even £99.99 sounds less than £100.00.

Just makes you think you may be getting a bargain!!

Answer 8

Selling something for say £99.99, let advertisers say you can buy it for less than a hundred pounds!

Frankly it's shopping spin and is an insult to our intelligence.

Funnily enough one of the main Supermarkets to have proper pricing is Iceland, not a fan but at least things are £1 or £2 and not 99p etc

Answer 9

If you round it up you would put the cost of living up as well so it would not be a good idea.

Answer 10

i bet in Usa they do this to

Answer 11

This is a pricing strategy created by J.C.Penny, a famous U.S. retailer.

.99 appears cheaper than 1.00. It does have a psychological effect on the buyer, and this translated into an edge over Penny's competition or Pence's if you please

Answer 12

Hi there,

This is known as Psychological pricing or price ending and it is believed that it has psychologically impact on customers and therefore derives more demand.Obviously from one pence, it doesn`t sound cheaper but it does have an impact.

Answer 13

Because 29.99 sounds more like 20 than 30.

Its a psycho trick.

Answer 14

it is done to make things look cheaper so you look at somthing for 2 pounds then you look at 1-99 and you think thats cheap

Answer 15

..... uk ish like the chepest place ever ....

an not as in like everithings cheap ...

as in ... it does tht .. cos there stupid and have nothing better to do with there times then make up .99p

rule >.>

Answer 16

I know what you mean! Some people think it makes products look cheaper, it's like in the U.S they use 95¢ on the end of everything. it's sometimes annoying when paying for something aswell you have to get all the odd change out when your in a hurry!

Answer 17

It's not just the UK.  I've seen it in South Africa, Australia and Germany and it's probably worldwide.

When did you look in Greece?  Was it when they had the Drachma?  The Drachma has no 'cents', so you couldn't do GRD 1.99, only whole numbers.  These days, they use the Euro which has cents.  See http://www.masoutis.gr/offers.jsp?CMCCod... and 'turn the page' in the brochure by clicking in the top right corner.

Why do it?  It fools you into thinking it's cheaper - 9.99 only has 3 digits so it looks much less then 10.00 which has 4 digits.  Similarly, 29.99 looks more like 20.00 than 30.00.

Answer 18

A major reason for doing this in small businesses is that, if there is a discrepancy in the takings at the end of the day and the till receipts, the mistake can be found by scanning the duplicate till roll.

If someone has put in an extra digit or missed one off a price when ringing in a sale, it will be very easy to spot because it will be the only item on the roll not ending in 99.