Other Office Supplies

Calculators: which one for which job

Casio with 27 products covers three entirely different needs that often get confused.

Desktop office models. Large keys, large display, tax and percentage functions. For accounts, a till, a shop — where you type fast and want to avoid mistakes.

Printing models. They print every entry. Essential wherever you need an audit trail of the calculation — cash reconciliation, stocktaking, accounting verification. The paper lets you find where the error occurred.

Scientific models. For school, students and technicians. Important: for national and professional examinations there are restrictions on which models are permitted — check what applies to your specific examination before buying.

Safes: what the ratings actually mean

Yale with 14 products covers this category, and there is a misconception worth clearing up.

A safe is not impregnable — it is a time delay. Certifications state how long it resists a particular kind of attempt, not that it cannot be opened.

That is why fixing is critical: a small safe that is not bolted to a wall or floor is simply picked up and carried away — and opened at leisure elsewhere. Serious models have ready-made fixing holes for exactly this reason.

And two things that get forgotten: fire protection is a different rating from burglary resistance — if you store documents or digital media, you need a fire rating; and keep the master code elsewhere, because opening a forgotten safe costs as much as a new one.

Stationery that genuinely differs

Posca and Sharpie are not ordinary markers, and the difference is worth knowing.

Posca. Water-based paint markers that write on almost any surface — glass, metal, wood, fabric, plastic — and are opaque, meaning they show on dark backgrounds. For shop windows, signage, craft and creative use.

Sharpie. Permanent, solvent-based. They write on what ordinary pens will not and do not wash off. For labelling boxes, warehouses, workshops, labels that must last.

Practical for both: store them horizontally with the cap on. A marker left open or upright dries out long before the ink runs out.

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