Paying in/changing coins for notes

Shakin_Steve

My son very proudly smashed his piggy bank recently and found that he had £120 in £1 coins and 50p's. He asked me how he could change it for notes and I was at a loss for an answer. I used to be able to take it to my local branch of Barclays, where I bank, but all they have now is a bank of ATM's downstairs and an area for appointments upstairs.
Does anyone else have these problems?

benten69

RBS & Natwest have coin counting machines, just dump them into the machine, it will count them all, print off a receipt and you take it to the teller where you can chose to deposit into an account or get cash.

Best of all, it's 100% free! They do not take any sort of commission!

Go into one of their branches that has the machine with all the coins and double check a non-customer can use it. As I bank with them I've never asked, but at no point does the machine ask for your bank card or anything.

All you do is open the lid, dump the coins, then close the lid and off it goes. Once it's done, you get your receipt.

Shakin_Steve

Thanks for that, but I just can't see it being free for non-customers. You can call me cynical if you like.:D

Candyapple

There are those coin counting machines in most supermarkets, enter your postcode to find your nearest one, but they usually charge a %
https://www.coinstar.co.uk/

Or if you're in London I think Metro bank still do the free coin counting?

Shakin_Steve

Candyapple wrote: »

There are those coin counting machines in most supermarkets, enter your postcode to find your nearest one, but they usually charge a %
https://www.coinstar.co.uk/

Or if you're in London I think Metro bank still do the free coin counting?

Coinstar take 10.9%:eek: No thanks.

eskbanker

If you're unconvinced about other banks and unhappy to pay to use independent services, that just leaves you with Barclays, what do they say when you ask them?

TheShape

My local Lloyds branch will take bagged coins although that will be into a Lloyds account and not as easy as dumping it in a counting machine.

Might see if I can use NatWest as I've got a new RBS account which I'll have for at least a week before switching it out for an incentive.

Shakin_Steve

eskbanker wrote: »

If you're unconvinced about other banks and unhappy to pay to use independent services, that just leaves you with Barclays, what do they say when you ask them?

I will ring and find out later and let you know. I can probably spend the £120 pretty quickly and give my son the notes, but it will be interesting to find out what would happen with a larger amount.

alanq

Candyapple wrote: »

Or if you're in London I think Metro bank still do the free coin counting?

Metrobank does allow non-customers to exchange coins free via their "Magic Money Machines". (Confirmed by Metrobank Tweet as recently as October 12th).

Also Metrobank is no longer confined to London.
e.g. Cambridge, Brighton, Newbury, Southend-on-Sea.

Dird

Just take the coins into any bank & say you want to exchange for notes. They'll count them & give you notes

firefox1956

Go into any bank or Post Office & ask for some £1 & 50p coin bags.
Then bag your coins up & take them into a bank or PO.
Its the counting & bagging up that they dont like as this takes time.
Ready bagged up coins are just quicky checked by weight.
HTH