To help the public distinguish the Php100 banknote from the Php1,000, Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) has announced that they will be releasing a new Php100 bill starting February 1, 2016.
Of course, it is not necessarily new in terms of design but BSP said that the new bill will have a stronger mauve or violet color compared with the existing one.
In January 29, 2016, the BSP released an official statement that read:
“The new bills are being released in order to make P100 bills more distinct from the P1,000 bill. This is in response to suggestions from the public to make it easier to distinguish from the P1,000 bill.”
In 2015, there have been several reports where people have complained about the confusing similarity between the 100 and 1,000 peso bills. The complaints have become so numerous that it later came to the attention of Senator Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III and he eventually asked the BSP for an explanation about it.
As a response to that, the BSP has now come up with a solution to resolve the problem for good.
Although all the design elements of the current bill will stay entirely the same, the new one will have a “stronger mauve or violet color on the obverse and reverse sides,” according to news website Rappler.
READ ALSO: WHY THIESE OLD BANKNOTES NEED TO CHANGE
The central bank also emphasized that the current Php100 bill can still be used for payment transactions. The bill will continue in circulation until the supplies last. However the old series launched in 1985 have already been discontinued. Those who still have the New Design Series (NDS) may exchange their bills to the appropriate amount at the authorized agent banks and BSP offices until December 31, 2016.
Hopefully, this permanently addresses the problem so that the general public will no longer have to worry about mistakenly using Php1,000 instead of Php100.
WATCH the video via GMA 24 ORAS