Banks refused legal tender coins by the UK Royal Mint

Interesting read;

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/...irmiles-cash-bank-s-refusing-accept-them.html

 

Shit. My purchase of the recent 50 coin is now only worth spot on the silver content

 

That's just BS

 

The best laid plans of mice and men ..............

 

Hahaha, that's hilarious.

But on a serious note, actually the face value CAN be cashed in if it's legal tender. If this challenge went virtually any court, it would be upheld.

Commemorative or not, legal tender is legal tender. Lest the government be put up on fraud, counterfeiting charges etc.

The royal mint should have consulted legal too before writing the letter, stupid.

 

The Royal Mint was privatized a few years ago. This was no doubt some genius marketing manager's idea to revamp their product line with new and innovative releases ("Guys, we literally have a license to print money!").

You'd be able to pay the government with those coins (taxes, fines, etc.) but nobody else is obliged to accept a particular form of legal tender.

...or before producing the coins in the first place.

 

Wasn't even their own idea, Royal Canadian Mint has been doing it for years and Canadians had the same issues when they went to pay for goods or deposit them in banks. They are not money.

Also wasn't even the unlucky coin collectors original idea. Over in the USA they were trying to promote their Presidential Dollars program and people were doing exactly the same thing. Buying the coins at face value on their credit cards, free delivery and then depositing them straight into their bank account and paying off the credit cards. Airmiles all round. They put a stop to that years ago as well.

I was getting coins from the UK series on the grounds that I have a UK bank account so it is easy enough to have 10 in a silver coin as it is to have them in paper banknotes. However if they are just tokens with 3 or whatever's worth of silver in them I won't get any more. It was the thought that I had the 10 stop loss on them that made them attractive, even if I had to take them to a bank to get my money back.

I was eagerly waiting for Australia to 'come up' with the 'innovation' as well but if they do I would be confirming that I could actually get my money back if I needed to.

And as for the mint only accepting back its legal tender if it is still in the original packaging... shows you how important the coin actually is if it is worthless without the cardboard.

Oh well, it was too good to be true.

 

If it truly is offered as legal tender, couldn't it be offered a settlement of the credit card debt? If credit card companies refuse to accept legal tender, in theory they shouldn't have any further legal recourse to recover the debt.

 

By definition, if you can't cash these coins in at the bank the only way to 'use' these coins is to... 'circulate' them
(weather through spending, or paying debts.. the coins still circulate)

How does it matter if the owner decides to look at them on their mantelpiece for 10 years, and then circulate them.
The whole point of having legal tender status is that the coins may be used as legal tender when the owner choses to use them.

The coins won't circulate as quickly as your average coins, but eventually they will ciculate..

And the original packaging with original purchase line is another whole issue in itself..

I wonder if you can return the coins to the mint under consumer law because its 'unfit for its common purpose' and/or not as described.

 

And why?

Pulling out the "they're not intended to be used as cash" line is pretty stupid. You can take pretty much any other kind of product and sell it for 20 or 50 or 100 or whatever, all the normal consumer laws and stuff apply and everyone knows exactly what the deal is. Then they take the one thing that should be completely unambiguous - cash - and say sure, it's money, except if you want to use it as money and then it's not money (but it's still, like, totally, money).

Why do that?

They get to take however much worth of silver, wrap it up in plastic and cardboard and sell it for five times what it cost to make. Sure, some will get cashed in at the bank for face value and the bank will sell them back to the mint at face value, but loads won't and at the end of the day the mint gets the silver back to melt down and do the whole thing again.

They can add shipping charges, credit card surcharges and household limits and cut down the manufactured "churn", but they could keep the whole scheme running and still make a shedload of profit.

 

Simple, go to bank to pay credit card with coin. When they refuse legal tender get it in writing and default on loan then take them to court for breech of contract

 

so what about our $200 gold coins? I know a lot of people buy them because they are under the belief that worse case scenario they are worth $200?

 

NCLT - non-circulating legal tender


Here's what the RCM has to say..

Can I redeem a collector coin at a bank or use it as currency to purchase goods or services?

All coins manufactured by the Mint are legal tender. However, unlike Canadian circulation coins, collector coins are non-circulating legal tender (NCLT). As such, these coins are not intended for daily commercial transactions and accepting them as payment or for redemption is at the discretion of businesses and financial institutions.

The Mint has a process in place to reimburse financial institutions the face value of redeemed NCLT coins, once they have accepted them from a customer and returned them to the Mint. In the event a bank branch is unaware of this procedure, customers are advised to contact the Mint with the coordinates of the bank branch, which will take steps to inform the branch of the redemption process.

As collector coins can only be redeemed at face value by businesses and financial institutions willing to accept them, it is recommended that individuals wishing to sell a collector coin first consult with a coin dealer, who is more likely to offer a price above face value.


Slightly different, but here in the US, a business can refuse to accept a $100 bill should they choose (due to counterfeit risk). Is a $100 bill not legal tender??

How about handing over 10,000 US pennies for a $100 purchase? Is a penny not legal tender??


For a bank, they have the knowledge (hopefully) & experience of handling real $100 bills.

For 10K pennies? They'll accept at the bank, but only after telling you to go get them rolled first. Basically they don't want to deal with the hassle of all those loose pennies.


And the same goes for those UK banks, methinks: They just don't want to deal with the *hassle* (i.e., time/expense) of exchanging those commemorate legal tender coins for "real" money.


Yeah, those 20-for-20 or 100-for-100 or whatever is just another way for a mint to charge some people a much higher premium than they could have otherwise gotten..

I steer clear of them.

 

You occasionally hear of people who are friendly with bank staff and get offered these coins at face value.

I guess some do still get handed in but it is in the bank's own self interest to take $400 worth of gold and give the customer $200 worth of fiat. Not so much for the bank to take in 3 of silver and give out 10 worth of fiat.

 

If gold ever drops below $678 AUD per oz the $200 face value becomes relevant. If it did drop that low it would be a worse case scenario.

 

correct, that bloke in Adelaide who tried to pay his parking tickets with five cent coins found that out.

 

I would try to pay cc bill with coins record it as well however it will probably not be accepted which means the account will be defaulted on and the annoyance that goes along with that.

 

This was certainly my theory in stacking a shitload of the State and other $10 silver coins - I could always cash them back for face value at least.
It's kinda like rewriting a contract after it is already signed.

I don't feel particularly sorry for the guy concerned - he was trying to rip off someone else and the scheme went astray. Bummer, but that's the risk you take. But the principle that legal tender isn't worth anything really underscores the value of fiat - absolutely stuff all!