Should we switch to plastic bank notes? 24 September 2013 at 11:39AM in MoneySaving polls 15 replies 2.6K views

Toyotaman

The Northern Bank (now Danske Bank) in Northern Ireland issued polymer £5 notes many years ago. They proved to be a disaster and are out of circulation. Considerable problems were experienced with Bank note counting machines and sorting machines which meant hand counting. This proved to be very labour intensive.
I only hope that the Bank of England are aware of this and do not cause the banks a huge headache and the taxpayer an absolute fortune. Surely they have reserched all aspects of plastic bank notes????

ap1986

chocaholicmanc wrote: »

Perhaps they should go a step further and do what New Zealand do and scrap 1p and 2p coins. If you pay for something by card you pay the exact amount. If you pay by cash it gets rounded down if under 5p and rounded up if over 5p (eg £1.54 becomes £1.50 and £1.56 becomes £1.60). Fantastic system which eliminates some of the horrible dirty coins!

But I definitely think making the notes more durable would be better. No more taped together £5 notes!

I agree with this one!

It makes sense to get rid of the 1p's and 2p's, unless you have a 1p/2p arcade machine addiction, then you'd be pretty stuffed.

All I seem to do with coppers is spend my time trying to get rid of them. When they've been in my purse for two weeks they get put into the penny pot at home and never get spent.

Nicky101

i guess there will be pros and cons.
some people might not get used to it.
but if it can help prevent some crime then it could be of use

Justamum

We had them from 1983 to 1988 over here. I'm not 100% sure why - there was a rumour that the place they were printed went bankrupt! When they did come out we were told they were impossible to tear, so for a while many of them were slightly out of shape because people were trying to tear them, but ended up stretching them a bit. I've still got one somewhere.

MothballsWallet

Toyotaman wrote: »

The Northern Bank (now Danske Bank) in Northern Ireland issued polymer £5 notes many years ago. They proved to be a disaster and are out of circulation. Considerable problems were experienced with Bank note counting machines and sorting machines which meant hand counting. This proved to be very labour intensive.
I only hope that the Bank of England are aware of this and do not cause the banks a huge headache and the taxpayer an absolute fortune. Surely they have reserched all aspects of plastic bank notes????

Bank Of England doing research? I doubt it, they probably spend most of the day looking for the cheapest deals on champagne or pinot. Or Bugatti Veyrons...