"It's one of the most significant things that's happened in my lifetime for people who are blind like me," says Maguire, a policy adviser at Vision Australia.

"It gives us for the first time full participation in using cash without the need to rely on others or use devices."

The new $5 note features a single bump on both of the long sides of the note. Eventually, the Reserve Bank will issue all bank notes with similar bumps - a different quantity for each denomination.

The tactile feature will directly benefit about 360,000 Australians who are blind or have low vision.

Currently many of them use a small device to measure the size of bank notes, which vary by a few millimetres. Maguire has several devices dating back to the introduction of decimal currency in 1966.

"It takes 15-20 seconds to distinguish a note, sometimes a bit more if the note is crinkled and the corners curled down," Maguire says.

"If you're at home and you've got plenty of time to sort out the notes and put them in your wallet it's effective but if you're in a shop and you're given a bunch of notes in your change and there are 15 people behind you, it's not feasible."

Electronic payments such as eftpos and tap n go are generally not accessible for blind people, except those prepared to rely on the honesty and diligence of the shopkeeper. Mobile payments such as Apple Pay offer some promise because of the audio features, but Maguire says most people with low vision are over the age of 65 and slow to take up smartphones.

The introduction of the new banknotes are a personal victory for Sydney teenager Connor McLeod, who was born blind.

As a child Connor only used coins because they were easy to tell apart by touch. But when he was 11 he received some bank notes for Christmas – the only problem was he had to ask his mum how much it was.

The following year, Connor and his mum started a Change.org petition calling for tactile features to be included on Australian bank notes, in line with other countries such as Canada. It eventually got more than 57,000 signatures.

Connor also contacted the Reserve Bank. At first he got a brush-off, but he refused to take no for an answer.

"He came home from school one day and said 'mum, I think we need to get a lawyer'," recalls his mother, Ally Lancaster.

Macleod did team up with a legal firm, who took the case pro bono and helped him lobby MPs and lodge a complaint to the Human Rights Commission, with Vision Australia as the secondary complainant.

In February 2015 the Reserve Bank called to tell him his efforts were successful and flew him to Melbourne for a tour of the note-printing facility.

"I'm stoked," says Connor. "It's good to feel that what I did is going to help me later and everyone else as well. It's more independence … I could even get a beginner job because a lot of them involve cash handling."

As a person with normal vision, at least when I wear glasses, I've always loved the bright colours of Australian bank notes.

But my new favourite thing is something you can barely see.