Percentage Increases and Decreases

1) A shop increases the prices of all its goods by 15%.

(a) What is the new price of a coat that was priced £29.50
(b) A jacket now costs £50.60. What was the price before the increase?

2) VAT is charged at 17.5% on most goods bought.

(a) A computer is advertised at £680 + VAT. What is the full price?
(b) Another computer is £940 (including VAT). What is the price excluding VAT?

3) A plant has grown by 18% in a week. If it is now 70.8cm, how tall was it last week?

4) A savings account increases in value by 6% per year. If the balance is now £954,
What was the balance a year ago? (b) What will the balance be in a year’s time?
(a)

5) The cost of a cooker is £329 including VAT at 17.5%.

(a) What is the price before VAT is added? (b) How much is the VAT on this cooker?

6) A shop reduces the price of all goods by 20% in a sale.

(a) What is
the sale price of a CD player which was priced at £48?
(b) A radio
is now priced at £25.60. What was the price before the sale?

7) A firm is reducing the number of staff in each department by 15%

(a) There were 240 staff in the sales department before the reduction. How many are there
now?
(b) There are now 255 staff in the packing department. How many were there before?

8) The number of students in a school decreases by 30%. If there are now 630 students, how
many were there before the decrease?

9) The price of a share has fallen by 35% to 312p. What was the price before?

10) The value of a car decreases by 15% each year. It is now worth £2380
(a) How much will it be worth in one year’s time?
(b) How much was it worth one year ago?
 PERCENTAGE PROBLEMS III

1) I invest £2000 in a savings account paying 6% per annum interest. If I leave all the money in the account, how much
will I have after: (a) 1 year (b) 3 years (c) 20 years

2) The population of a certain country is estimated to increase by 8% each year. In 1990 it was 45 million. Assuming
8% growth per year,
(a) What will it be in (i) 1995? (ii) 2010?
(b) In what year will the population first exceed 100 million?

3) The value of my car depreciates by 12% each year. I paid £8000 for it.
(a) What will it be worth after I have had it for 4 years?
(b) After how many years will it be worth less than half what I paid for it?

4) Suppose the savings account in Q1 paid 0.5% per month interest. Recalculate your answers for this new situation.

5) A second hand car salesman has a markup of 30% on all the cars which he sells.
(a) He buys a car for £2350. How much will he sell it for?
(b) He offers a car for sale at £2275. How much did he pay for it?

6) A shop is advertising a sale with 20% off all goods.

(a) What is the sale price of a dishwasher with a full price of £450?
(b) What was the full price of a freezer costing £352 in the sale?

7) A video recorder is priced at £185, including VAT at 17.5%. However, I can buy through an organisation which is
exempt from VAT. How much will I pay for the video recorder?

8) In a school of 960 pupils, a class carrying out a survey about methods ,of travelling to school gives a questionnaire to
180 pupils. They find that 26 pupils cycle to school.
(a) What percentage of those questioned cycled to school?
(b) If this is representative of the school as a whole, how many pupils cycle to school?

9) (a) Alex has £340 in her building society account on 1st January 1990. The account pays 12% interest per annum.
How much will she have on 1st January 1991?
(b) On 1st January 1991, Alex withdraws £120 to buy a bike. If she makes no more withdrawals, how much will she
have on 1st January 1992?

10) The number of cars on the road is estimated to increase by 5% each year. There were 8.4 million cars in 1990; how
many will there be in 1995?

11) (a) The population of a town has fallen by 12% in the last ten years. The present population is 54120. What was the
population ten years ago?
(b) The number of children in schools in the town has fallen by 18%. If there were 9500 schoolchildren ten years ago,
how many are there now?
(c) Find what percentage the number of schoolchildren formed of the total population (i) ten years ago and (ii) today.

12) It is estimated that a new car depreciates in value by 30% during the first year of its life, and 20% during subsequent
years. I buy a new car .for £7200, and keep it for 4 years. How much is it worth at the end of this time?

13) An estate agent charges 1.5% commission on the sale of houses. On a certain house they made £1440. How much
was the house sold for?

14) The rate of VAT is 17.5%. A firm wishes to keep the price of a camera under £100 by advertising it as "____ +
VAT = only £99 !!". What price should ____ be?