5 Groschen voucher, Wiener Verkehrsbetriebe, 1947
Gutschein der Wiener Verkehrsbetriebe
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This copy
- Accession
- OM-00298
- Serial
- 11 022109
- Series year
- 1947
- Actually issued
- 1947
- Signatures
- This issue carries no bank manager or cashier signature.
- Grade
- XF (IBNS)
Light even toning and soft corners from being carried; no fold through the text. Estimated from the 600 dpi archival scan, which shows folds, soiling and edge condition but not paper crispness, pinholes, pressing or small repairs.
- Estimated value
- $5.5 indicative
Category benchmark scaled for grade — an order of magnitude, not an appraisal. Priced 2026-09-26.
- Dimensions
- 76.1 × 53.3 mm (±1.6, from the scan)
- Themes
- ViennaTransportFare voucherPostwar AustriaEmergency money
The type
- Type
- 5 Groschen voucher, Wiener Verkehrsbetriebe, 1947
- Printer
- Not established
- Rarity
- scarce
Inscriptions
Gutschein der Wiener Verkehrsbetriebe, verrechenbar fuer 5 Groschen, nur gueltig zum Loesen von Fahrausweisen bei Schaffnern und Fahrausweis-Verkaufsstellen bis zu einem Zeitpunkte, der durch oeffentliche Verlautbarung bekanntgegeben werden wird. Fahrgaeste, die das Fahrgeld nicht abgezaehlt bereithalten koennen, muessen den Wagen nicht verlassen, wenn sie beim Wechseln bereitgehaltener Geldmittel Gutscheine entgegennehmen.
Voucher of the Vienna transport undertaking, accountable for 5 Groschen, valid only for buying tickets from conductors and ticket offices until a date to be announced publicly. Passengers who cannot have the exact fare ready need not leave the car, provided they accept vouchers when change is given.
Symbology
- A serial number
- Vs. 9950/22 - 1947, and a six-figure number. Unlike the 1920 communal notes this one is individually accounted for: a transport company answerable to a city audit could not print bearer paper without numbering it.
- Valid only for fares
- It is not money and does not claim to be. The voucher buys tickets and nothing else, which is what kept it legal in a country that now had a functioning central bank.
- An open expiry
- Redeemable "until a date to be announced publicly" - the same formula Eferding's food office used in 1920, for the same reason: nobody knew how long the shortage would last.
- The hexagonal underprint
- A honeycomb pattern printed in pink across the whole face, the cheapest available protection against copying on a pass-sized slip of paper.
What was happening
Twenty-seven years after Vienna printed fifty-Heller notes because shops could not give change, its transport undertaking printed five-Groschen vouchers for the same reason.
In 1947 Vienna was divided into four occupation sectors, the schilling had been reintroduced in 1945 and cut back again in the currency reform of December 1947, and coin was once again scarce. A tram conductor who could not give change could not sell a ticket. So the Wiener Verkehrsbetriebe issued numbered vouchers, redeemable only against fares, with an instruction printed on the face that is worth reading twice: passengers who cannot have the exact fare ready must not leave the car when changing money, and are obliged to accept vouchers in change.
That is the whole mechanism of emergency money in two sentences, written for a tram platform - a promise of future service standing in for coin, made compulsory in the small area where the issuer has authority.
This account belongs to the type, not this copy — it is shared by every 5 Groschen voucher, Wiener Verkehrsbetriebe, 1947 in the collection.
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