If you’ve a piggy bank or coin jar, watch out– your £1 coins will soon be unspendable

miller

It wouldn't be so bad if all the old ones disappeared on 28 March and there was a whole 6 months to offload/purge the old ones, but they wont will they?

I got caught out when the tenner changed last time. I reckon I'll be as awkward as the shops will be and start refusing the old coins about a month before they can't be spent. I'll have 50ps or the new £1 coins instead of a trip to the bank thanks.

mj104

Karl
I’ve made a petition – will you sign it? And will you post it to all of your MSE subscribers please?
If you go to the petition.parliament.uk website you will find it on there at
petition.parliament.uk/petitions/182609/sponsors/
My petition:
Reintroduce the £1 note
As a symbol of our Great Britain reintroduce the £1 note to symbolize our greatness after Brexit! The United States places great importance on the US Dollar bill and we should do the same with our £1 note. They should also be made in the same polymer as the new £5 note says the Bank of England.
"The Bank of England periodically replaces notes to introduce the latest new security features and stay ahead of counterfeiters. It also means that we can feature new characters" It goes on to say "Polymer notes are also better for the environment. This is because they last longer and so we have to print fewer notes, which means less energy is used in manufacturing and cash transportation. When a polymer note has reached the end of its life it will be recycled into new plastic products"
Regards

mj104

DominicH

Sorry, this is a bit of a hobby horse of mine, but the notion of "legal tender" has nothing directly to do with whether shops will accept particular coins or notes. Shops, and people engaging in any type of trade, can accept whatever they want in exchange for their goods. Coins and notes of any type, IOUs, cowrie shells, whatever.
Legal tender is purely about what types and amounts of currency must be accepted in settlement of debts. That is, if the matter goes to court, the debtor can say "I offered to pay the debt in £5 notes" and, provided that £5 notes are legal tender for the amount in question, they will be deemed to have offered payment of the debt. If they tried to pay it with thousands of 1p coins, or indeed cowrie shells, the lender would have the legal case that no attempt to pay the debt was made.

Coins worth less than £1 are already not legal tender except for very small debts, and no one worries about that.

When you buy things in shops, there no debt (to the shop). You are paying for the thing before you receive it. Things like meals in restaurants, or haircuts, technically you receive the thing first, but you pay for it immediately.

Of course, many shops may refuse to accept the old £1 coin in due course. But that's up to them.

miller

Talking of fivers, there are still a lot of the old ones floating about and on the 5th May they will assume a pariah status. I am still receiving them in change, but will start refusing them well before the 5th May. Confirms my thought that "6 months" grace is definitely not long enough. It should be 12 months IMO.

thriftwizard

Relevant to me, as a market trader; I have two "floats" stashed away, one of which is in more or less constant use & will probably "change out" more or less by itself. But the other only sees the light of day when we're doing stalls in more than one location, which doesn't happen often now, and I'd be in danger of finding my "float" - which counts as cash-at-hand - was suddenly worthless! So, many thanks, OP...