10 Dollars

New Zealand switched to polymer for its circulating notes in 1999, adopting the substrate developed by the Reserve Bank of Australia and printed by Note Printing Australia in Melbourne — a straightforward trans-Tasman arrangement that eliminated a chronic counterfeiting problem with the preceding paper series. The P#186 series ran through three successive governors, each requiring a new signature pairing, which accounts for the three distinct signature varieties collected under the same Pick number.

Polymer notes of this issue are prone to heat distortion if left in direct sunlight or a hot vehicle — a known physical vulnerability of the substrate in its earlier formulations that affected the New Zealand and Australian issues alike.