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features as variable size, variable color, and tactile markings. In some cases, a device is made available to blind people to aid in denominating banknotes. For example, England issues a size template, and Canada supplies its blind citizens with a portable banknote reader with audio output.
New Banknote Design
By 1996, the U.S. Treasury Department's Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) expects to begin production of a new design for the $100 bill. In each succeeding year, working in descending order, a new design for a denomination will be introduced. By the year 2001, all six denominations currently in production ($100, $50, $20, $10, $5, and $1) will have been redesigned. A major motivation for this redesign is the incorporation of new security features to combat the threat of counterfeiting posed by the rapid development in advanced copying and imaging systems that allow even the unskilled user to make faithful full-color reproductions of documents.
This redesign presents an opportunity to introduce features into the design that will make U.S. banknotes more readily usable by visually disabled people. The timetable of the redesign also presents the opportunity to incorporate features that may require some development work into the smaller denominations within the current redesign sequence. To this end, the Committee on Currency Features Usable by the Visually Impaired was charged to:
assess features that could be used by people who are visually disabled to recognize, denominate, and authenticate banknotes;
recommend features that could reasonably be incorporated into banknotes using available technology;
suggest strategies that should be instituted to make the recommended features most effective; and
identify research needs in particularly promising areas that could lead to attractive future approaches.
In the study, three aspects of currency transactions were defined: recognition (is this meant to be a banknote?), denomination (how much is it worth?), and authentication (is it a real banknote?). An additional consideration of importance, especially with regard to the use of machines accepting cash, was the usefulness of features indicating orientation of the banknote. The primary goal of the committee was to recommend features that will help visually disabled people denominate banknotes, since reliable denomination is essential to their maintaining independence. The committee also evaluated features that will help these individuals authenticate banknotes, a process for which the individuals have the same needs as the normally sighted public. Such features could be added in addition to those included for use in denomination. The committee did not consider the entire mix of the circulating medium in the U.S. but focused solely on solutions to problems dealing with banknotes.
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