Change

digitalscream

Lately, over the last few weeks, I've been getting annoyed by having change in my pockets. No idea why, but I've got in the habit of just chucking it all in a jar every night.

Anyway, I found myself out of cash and I object to using the cash machine in the shop next door (it's one of those "£1.99 charge every time" ones), so I thought I'd just raid the jar and see if there was enough for something decent for lunch, given that tonight's shopping night (yay).

There seemed to be an awful lot of £1 and 50p coins in there when I tipped it out, so I thought I'd count 'em up.

£91.50, not counting all the 20p-and-smaller coins! I'd guess there's probably another £30 or £40 in there from those. I'm amazed at the sheer amount of money that I hadn't noticed going in there.

Anybody else do this?

RaymondLin

I chuck it in my man bag, and a little pouch in the car for parking.

Now and again I take out £5 to buy lunch.

randella

Yep.  It's a habit I started in Australia as the coins there are like old-fashioned UK money - i.e. big and heavy.  After a few months there was enough for my wife and I to go and eat at a half-decent seafood place.

I carried on doing it here and right now I'm due for a count-up, there's plenty in there by now - I just can't be bothered .

I raid it for the weekly work lotto contribution, and Mrs. R. dives in for bus money sometimes.  It's pretty handy.

sweepy

I have an old SMA tin that I drop all my shrapnel in and then pop to the Coinstar machine in Sainsbury's. It's surprising how much you collect after even 6 months, I'm calling it my "Pedal Fund"

PolarityMan

I ended up with £5 in 20ps from band practice last night

digitalscream

My surprise, really, is that it's well over a ton that I hadn't even noticed was missing from my normal monthly activities. It actually feels like free money.

If I was a bit more mature and sensible, I'd have a long look at my monthly finances to see where I'm wasting it.

If.

littlegreenman

Yep. Not the £ coins but everything else.

Cash it in every 6 months or so. Just did mine recently, which has paid for my flights to go to Paris for the Tour de France.

Teetonetal

My Grandparents used to do that with small change ( so less than 50p) when we went to visit them, they'd always let us kids count it up and split it between us. We always had about £20 to share (back in the 80's). nice tradition.

Dominic

AARRGH .......reminds me of a school friend when we were kids...........his father was a multi-millionaire landlord with numerous bedsits .....my friend used to sneak around to his Dads huge porfolio and break into the meters every weekend - I have never seen so much change in my life .........hid dad caught him in the end after the police got involved !

lloyd

Aye, got a big jar-must be 3 litres or so in the kitchen, I throw pretty much all my change in there.

It's good for raiding the quids if you've no cash on you and want to pop to the local shop for small stuff.

It's nearly at the top and when it is I'll get it all changed and treat myself to something-depending on how many times the quids and 50's have been raided could be a couple hundred in there. 

They key to having a decent haul is the pound coins, I give it a shake every now and then to force the quids away from the top and temptation/laziness....Good way of saving "free money"

RaymondLin

This actually reminds me that my sister actually did this and saved up enough to buy a La-z-boy. 

CabbageCat

I have a bucket for shrapnel that I never empty. It filled up years ago so now that corner of my living room is littered with coins of all values (including $, € and NZ$). I resent those coinstar machines taking a big cut so tried getting rid of handfuls of them in the self-service tills at Tesco but I haven't been able to keep up with the influx. God knows how much is in there. Easily enough for a decent weekend city break.

vasselmeyer

I do this with all my change including £1 and £2 coins. End of the day I split out copper, silver and £1 and £2 coins. Last time I counted the £1 and £2 coins I scored enough for a luxury weekend away for me and the missus.

Steffo

I have a "Ferrari Fund" piggy bank. I reckon there is enough change in there for a hubcap...

Fretwired

digitalscream said:

Lately, over the last few weeks, I've been getting annoyed by having change in my pockets. No idea why, but I've got in the habit of just chucking it all in a jar every night.

Anyway, I found myself out of cash and I object to using the cash machine in the shop next door (it's one of those "£1.99 charge every time" ones), so I thought I'd just raid the jar and see if there was enough for something decent for lunch, given that tonight's shopping night (yay).

There seemed to be an awful lot of £1 and 50p coins in there when I tipped it out, so I thought I'd count 'em up.

£91.50, not counting all the 20p-and-smaller coins! I'd guess there's probably another £30 or £40 in there from those. I'm amazed at the sheer amount of money that I hadn't noticed going in there.

Anybody else do this?

Yes. I can't stand change and like you it builds up. I fancy walking in Coda Music and buying a pedal and then tipping out the contents of my jar on the counter .. would probably get banned .. :-)

Sesh

I used to have an oversized plastic Budweiser bottle. We filled it with small change (nothing more than 50ps), mainly from the left overs from the night before. It got to the point where it was too heavy to lift with one hand, and then one day the bottom gave way. There was a couple of hundred pounds in there. Now that I rarely drink out, use cards more and have kids, I haven't seen more than £10 of change in one place around the house.

stickyfiddle

I haven't carried coins in years. I have a box by the kitchen with change in it that I take out of when I know I need coins (supermarket trolleys, etc) but all my shrapnel goes in there whenever I have any. Occasionally it gets 90% emptied (all the small stuff but leaving half the bigger value coins usually) and taken to the bank

PC_Dave

RaymondLin said:

I chuck it in my man bag

@chillidoggy will be in his element soon!

strtdv

I'm on holiday in DC at the moment, and over here change seems to be entirely useless due to a combination of the fact that $1 is a note, and sales tax means that you get really odd small amounts of change back.

At home I keep a change drawer in the hall and every so often get £20 out of it. The coppers get given in bulk to charity every so often (charities can deposit more coppers in the bank than other groups)

Panama_Jack666

vasselmeyer said:

I do this with all my change including £1 and £2 coins. End of the day I split out copper, silver and £1 and £2 coins. Last time I counted the £1 and £2 coins I scored enough for a luxury weekend away for me and the missus.

I do this too! Not sure how much I'm up to yet... maybe a Nobles Overdrive.

RobDavies

I save every bit of change I get. 

 £1 and £2 coins go into those money tins that you can only open with a can opener. When full, they hold £500 each - I usually fill one per year and after two years that becomes the spending money for our Cyprus holidays. 

 All other change goes into a jar and that gets saved to go towards the Christmas food shop - I can usually bank on about £80 to £100 for that, so that's a pretty big dent in that particular bill.