The new $10 bill looks like it was left out in the sun too long.
Of course, this doesn’t take the conversion rates into consideration. The British pound is currently worth about 1.8 US dollars.
Because the high-value coins in common circulation (1 and 2 pounds) are often given back as change, you may discover you’ll get more coins than you know what do to with. I never really understood why they call their currency “pounds”. It wasn’t until I visited and quickly accumulated enough pocket change to make me walk in a tight circle, that I discovered British currency is indeed a cruel and unforgiving unit of weight. 
I think that’s why he ranked the 20p above the 25c.
sigh There’s no head-smacking smiley graphic big enough, some days.
Huh. Ask anyone old enough to remember the pre-decimal coinage and they’ll tell you today’s coins are flimsy wee things by comparison.
As well as the various Northern Irish bank notes that no-one in England, Scotland or Wales will accept.
The two pound coin is the coin that most often features anniversary designs, by virtue of the fact that its the largest. There’s also a Northern Irish pound coin with a handful of flax on the back, flax being a crop from days gone by.
Not true. The “national” designs are issued throughout the UK. For instance, the design of the £1 coin is changed every year. So one year all the £1 coins issued might carry the Welsh leek, the next year they might all have a Scottish thistle, the year after that they might have an English rose, etc.
The queen’s on everything? And the Americans get accused of having boring money…
Not totally true. As long as a Northern Ireland note has the word sterling printed on it, it is acceptable tender. Most large store chains should accept them, and you should have no trouble changing them at banks.
Wrong on both counts.
Now, a decision to put Darwin onto an American note, that would be interesting
Strange-but-true fact: Dickens was replaced on the £10 note by Darwin, partly because Darwin’s beard is bushier and thus harder to forge.
I’ve heard a similar story about Elgar on the £20. However, I’m not convinced - Elizabeth Fry isn’t all that hairy!
I recently received two £5 notes in my change with George Stephenson on them (he’s since been replaced by Elizabeth Fry, presumably because her beard is bushier than Stephenson’s ). I’ve tried to spend them in a number of shops but nobody will take them. But surely they’re still valid currency? Do banknotes really cease to be valid if the design is changed? Coins don’t, after all. I realise a bank would exchange these notes, but that’s not my question. If a shopkeeper says “I can’t accept those notes”, is he/she telling the truth?
I confess, I heard my Darwin “fact” on The News Quiz, so its provenance might not actually be the best.
Could I be any wronger in this thread? Sometimes it’s not worth getting out of bed, is it?
Another wrong fact: Sterling is thus called because it was invented by Joshua Sterling in 1913 to replace the “pound”, the name of which which offended Suffragettes who were worried about their weight.
As GorillaMan said earlier (and which I confess I didn’t know until it came up in a similar thread a while back), the concept of legal tender only applies to the settling of debts, not to transactions where you pay for something before you receive it. Shopkeepers are under no obligation to sell you anything, and may decline for any reason (unless maybe by doing so they would violate anti-discrimination laws), including that they prefer not to receive discontinued banknotes.
I wonder why that isn’t done in the U.S.? Great way not to mistake bills.
Is it just me, or do stories like this just make you want to pat the recounter on the head and say “well done”?
Nope, they’re not valid currency. As already noted, any transaction is a private matter, and so you’ve chosen to accept these as (re)payment of £10. However, nobody is obliged to accept them. You can exchange any outdated notes with the Bank of England itself, in person - because they’re who the ‘promise to pay’ line refers to.
When did they change the shape of the 20p coin? When I was last in the UK it was round and confused the heck outta me because the 10p coin was larger than the 20p.
Mind you, we in Oz, have since then introduced gold(ish) coins to replace our $1 and $1 notes and the two dollar coin is smaller than the one dollar. That took ages to get used to. :mad:
Colors, I’ll concede, though imagining Hoyt Axton writing “I don’t give a damn about a rainbow dollar” just doesn’t cut it. Different sizes is inconvenient. The smaller bills insist on getting lost among the larger ones in your billfold.
BTW, historical US currency wasn’t always as uniformly green as more recent bills. Some of the old gold certificates were predominantly red or orange.
(Some of the late 19th early 20th century designs had things on the obverse other than portraits of dead politicians, too. The 1896 “educational” series was interesting, but not well received. “Electricity” was too scantily clad on the 5, and people objected.)