New law allows store to round up or down to the nearest five cent increment

YUMA, Ariz. (KYMA) - You may be losing some change at the register when you pay in cash.

Gov. Katie Hobbs (D-Ariz.) has signed new legislation, House Bill 2938, in Arizona about cash payments, into law and in now in effect.

"I don't like that. Stores need to adjust accordingly," says Nancy Ripp, Yuma local.

The law says retailers that take cash and do not have pennies or accept them, can round the final sale to the nearest five-cent increment.

If the total ends in one, two, six, or seven, the bill will be rounded down to the nearest nickel.

If the bill ends in three, four, eight, or nine the total will be rounded up.

"I personally hate going to the bank when we run out of pennies. It's just not the biggest convenience at all to be honest with you, but yeah, I will be rounding up. When I'm out of pennies, I'm out of pennies, so I'm pretty happy about this," says Nicole Millis, local business owner.

The decision comes after the government decided last November that making pennies was causing businesses to lose money.

"It costs more money to mint one, than it is worth so," says Marlo Foss, local.

According to the United States Mint, it costs 3.69 cents to make a one cent penny, making it more expensive to produce a penny than it's actually worth.

Locals we spoke to say they dont mind this new legislations and say pennies were a waste anyways.

Candice Foss, another Yuma local, states, "I think it's fine. I mean it really was misleading anyway, it really was $10, but they just made it $9.99 to catch your eye or $79.99 to catch your eye, so let's just get rid of it."

The law does not apply to customer paying with credit ot debit cards and merchant still have to charge the exact amount.