I have a bucket of coins. It once held a pound of cookie dough, and it’s about a half-gallon or so in capacity. My credit union doesn’t have a coin counter, so they require that coins be rolled for deposit. Here are my options:
Roll the coins
[ul][li]Separate the coins into quarters, dimes, nickels, and pennies;[/li][li]Count the coins to determine the number of tubes I need (available free from the credit union);[/li][li]Drive a 30-mile round trip to get the tubes;[/li][li]Remove Canadian coins;[/li][li]Count and roll the coins;[/li][li]Write my account number on each roll;[/li][li]Drive a 30-mile round trip to deposit the rolled coins.[/ul][/li]
Or,
Use CoinStar
[ul][li]Drive an 8-mile round trip to the supermarket;[/li][li]Dump the coins into the machine;[/li][li]Collect the rejects (Canadian and damaged coins);[/li][li]Get a voucher from the machine;[/li][li]Collect the voucher and take it to the cashier;[/li][li]Drive a 30-mile round trip to deposit the cash.[/ul][/li]
I think CoinStar charges 12% if you want cash instead of a coupon/gift code. I estimate the bucket contains $300 or $400 in coins, so it might cost fifty bucks to count my change. On the other hand, the process of rolling the coins will take at least a couple of hours plus two long drives.
Which would you choose: Spend the time and effort to roll the coins, thus being able to deposit the entire amount? Or spend the exorbitant fee to have the machine count it for you and avoid the hassle?
You can buy the coin wrappers on Amazon and save one of the trips. Then the wrap-it-yourself option has less driving. You can also get a set of cheap plastic tubes that make it easier to count the coins – just dump each denomination in its tube until it’s full, then go directly from the tube to the wrapper. I say roll them yourself.
Wait…you’re saying that you can hand your CU a roll of coins for deposit, and they’ll accept it as (e.g.) a $10 roll of quarters, without taking it apart to verify that there are actually 25 quarters contained in said roll? Instead of 2 quarters and 23 steel washers?
Do they adhere to a similar policy for bundled paper currency?
I haven’t deposited coins in decades, but they (my other credit union) accepted the rolled coins in the presumed/stated amount. Then they sent them to wherever they send coins to, where they were counted. If there was a discrepancy, the discrepancy was to be deducted or added to my account.
EDIT:
Or what running coach said. That’s exactly why the account number had to be written on the rolls.
Use coinstar myself, I would skip the deposit trip and just keep the cash. I never have more than $40 or $50 bucks worth. I always split it up give it to my grandkids anyway.
Most banks have a coin counter machine right in the lobby and won’t accept hand-rolled coins. My CU has one, and its use is free for members. Last time I took rolled coins in, they sent me to the machine, and most of them were mint-issued rolls of quarters.
It has been a long time since I was a coin teller back in the 1980s but generally the coins were accepted at face value until proven otherwise. So as long as you had an account which could be charged if you went the slug route.
You can also weigh the coins. IIRC a roll of quarters weighs exactly 1/2 pound.
I would go the Coinstar/Amazon gift card route, because I don’t want the hassle of wrapping the coins (or possibly spending the money on the paper wrappers, although some banks will give them to you for free). I’m not interested in building up my account.
Coinstar/Amazon. It’s your best option for preserving your cash value. If you want to build up your new CU, deposit real money.
That’s what you get for living so near Canada. Down here in civilization my CU has a free coin counter in every location. Swipe your ATM card, pour your coins, and it spits out your deposit receipt.
most banks just weigh coin rolls these days…theres one Atm at the side of the BofA that has a slot for them and you have to have it just right for it to work …
I remember when my grandma made my stepgrandpa take in all his cans/jars coins in alter I moved in with them in 86 or 7 …they had to haul em in with a handcart
even with the huge coin counter they had it still took 2 hours and they just dumped them in … some of them jars were from back in the 60s … she was still finding jars of em here and there after he passed …
Compared to that, what’s the advantage of any other method (i.e., paying CoinStar a fee to receive cash-in-hand, or buying wrappers and spending hours hand-rolling coins)?
A gallon of pennies is @ $90. I know, because I use a 1 gallon glass jar as my penny jar and I’ve filled it up a couple of times.
Coinstar is ridiculous in the amount they charge and the time it takes to filter your coins into it.
Pull the silver coins out.
Look at all the dimes and quarters first (NOT nickels). Pull all the ones dated 1964 or earlier, as those are 90% silver and worth about 25 times their face value. You can sell them at any GOLD place, which are everywhere these days.
Spend the rest in your normal spending. Yes, it will take a while. I have two stashes for just that purpose. 1> My car. Too many coins there? Well, an medium cone at Dairy Queen is less than $3, there’s a bunch right there. Otherwise I hand people bills and coins so that I’m not getting coins back in change. 2> My game bag. The shop I play in sells chips and cola at 85 cents each, so every time I buy something while I’m playing, I just hand him exact change.
Beggar walks up to your car, give them a handful of coins. I did that a couple of years back, the guy looked at me with disgust and I pointed out that I’d just given him about $5 in change. His attitude changed.
Ever have a penny drive by local scouts or play the coin game for charity at work? Yeah, your team will thank you when you dump half a gallon of pennies into your team and a handful of silver coins in the other team’s jar.
Option 1 is overwrought insanity and, if I didn’t know better, intentionally written to maximize effort, mileage and hassle. And option 2 has OP driving 30 miles just to deposit a few hundred in cash?
Bring the coins before the next big grocery visit, use Coinstar to count them, collect the credit and spend it down over the next few months.
