using small change in a shop

Those changedepot machines: You pour the money in. It sorts it and prints a receipt of the total. You bring the receipt to the counter. They give you back your total in notes minus 9.5% of Total value.

Does that bank charge anything?

I once got a takeaway delivered and, being broke at the time, just about managed to cobble together enough cash for it. The guy called to the door and I told him that I only had what i owed in 20's. he said yeah, no probs a twenty is fine. He wasn't a happy bunny when I handed him €15 in bag comprised of 20 cent coins. At the time I felt like a scab, but the meal was ****, so justice was done!

I now pay only in change

Im all in favour of dropping the 1's and 2's - in Oz they have a good system where your amount is always rounded to the nearest 5c. Sometimes it works for you but sometimes not, but all in all you'll come out pretty even.

I remember shortly before the euro changeover there was a shortage of copper coins (1p and 2p). People (as we all do) were putting all their coppers in the change jars at home, therefore withdrawing them from circulation. Normally the solution to this is to mint more coppers. But the National Bank was working flat out trying to mint and print all the new euro currency. Hence the shortage of copper.

But ever cloud has it's silver lining. The banks were so desparate to get coppers to give to their retail customers that they would offer £6 for a £5 bag of copper! Made a nice lil bit extra on my 10 year hoard of copper.

ejmaztec wrote:

I remembered something from years ago in the UK where there was a maximum number of coins that could be used as legal tender. I wondered whether the same applied here and found the following:


http://www.reference.com/browse/wiki/Legal_tender

"According to the Economic and Monetary Union Act, 1998 of the Republic of Ireland which replaced the legal tender provisions that had been re-enacted in Irish legislation from previous British enactments, No person, other than the Central Bank of Ireland and such persons as may be designated by the Minister by order, shall be obliged to accept more than 50 coins denominated in euro or in cent in any single transaction."

payed for 20 smokes with 5 cent coins on a number of occasions. that was when the smokes were an even €6. 120 coins and they were accepted.
i couldn't care less what the cashier or the other customers think of me and my bag of change.

Sparks400 wrote:

The missus had to give Andrea Corr change for a ciggerette machine as she was a little short one evening.

Hasn't she always been a little short

I go through my change every few months, tis amazing what you accumulate. Can't stand carrying loads of coins around (always make sure I have the right bus fare though).

Many shops like getting small change.
I've seen many old men/women going into a shop for a litre of milk and when paying for it they empty the contents of their pockets onto the counter. The shopkeeper always takes the smallest coins possible.