Kiwibank is government owned and it's almost like a real one.

If you want to, for example, deposit some takings and get a couple hundred in change , you can deposit the takings at the central city Kiwibank in Whangarei, walk down to BNZ, get them to give you your change, walk back to the Kiwibank and by then it's quite likely they'll have finished counting it.

There are little plastic bank bags for coins. On them are marked how many coins they want in the plastic bags - $10 of silver or $100 of gold. In the BNZ, they have modern appliances called scales and they weigh the bags and pronounce them good bags or bad bags. At Kiwibank, they also have scales, but these are not for using. They're display scales only. They tip the money out of all of the bags, mix it thoroughly and then count the individual coins - one-mashed-potato, two-mashed-potato etc.

You're asking for trouble if you request a couple hundred in change at the central city Kiwibank. If you trot down the road to the BNZ and ask for couple hundred money they pop the requisite number of cylinders of pre-counted money into your outstretched hand. At Kiwibank, their brows furrow and they say "Ooh" doubtfully. They then disappear out the back. From there I presume they go through the double steel doors, down the lift, navigate the crocodile pit, through the second set of double steel doors, out the back window, onto their moped, scoot down the road to the BNZ, get the change, come back through the window, doors, pit and other doors and arrive at the counter a good 20 minutes to half an hour later. Then they begin counting it individually, while telling you "Ooh. Next time you'll need to ring through that sort of lofty amount of monies beforehand."

The wait can be entertaining though, because it's an opportunity to observe other customers. Customer approaches counter and asks question. Teller says "Ooh. That's a tricky question. We don't answer those sorts of questions here at the central city Kiwibank. You'll have to phone our tricky question-answering phone number. No, you can't do it from here." Next customer approaches counter. "Ooh. That's a tricky question....".