Has anyone come across this yet. Apparently in the course of updating some older models of currency counters to accept the new $5 bills, some manufacturers have decided to remove $2 bills. Some even removed the older style $50's. This past week, this has put a serious damper on my searching bundles of $2 bills as it eliminated several dump banks on me. I'm also guessing that when the new $100's roll out later this year, that additional bills will be removed. This will greatly accelerate $50's being removed from circulation along with whichever bill they pick next. Has anyone heard anything from the BEP or FRB regarding why support for $2 bills was chosen over say support for old style $5's or $10's?
have you looked around lately, when was the last time you saw a sign, no bills over $20 accepted, when was the last time you spent a $100, its been a while for me
so what you are saying, is the manufacturers are removing the ability of the currency counters to count the $2 note? maybe i am missing the point ...
Small restaurants who decide not to deal with $50 and $100 bills to reduce their exposure to theft and counterfeit notes doesn't pose much of an impact on the circulation of $50's and $100's. Large numbers of banks deciding not to accept $2 bills (albeit this is branch specific and limited to large quantities of bills) can have an impact on the ability of $2 bills to circulate. A branch that is unable to count/verify $2 bills is not only going to refuse large quantities (more than 50 to 100 bills), but is also going to be less likely to even order $2 bills. A bank that is unable to count/verify/audit $2 bills in their vault is not going to want any in their vault.
I'm also saying that this is going to greatly increase the number of pre-1996 $50's in the mutilated piles as some banks will not be able to verify them in their counters. As a result, anytime a teller runs a stack of $50's, she will immediately be alerted to the presence of an older $50. Due to the inability to run it through the counter, she will be more likely to put it in the mutilated pile so she won't have to deal with it again.
Can a bank, especially a bank whose deposits are insured by the FDIC, refuse to accept $2 bills? I am looking at a Series 2003 $2 and it clearly states "THIS NOTE IS LEGAL TENDER FOR ALL DEBTS PUBLIC AND PRIVATE". I can understand a business not accepting large bills (for counterfeiting reasons) but I have never heard of a bank refusing legal tender.
A bank is a business. The Federal Reserve Bank has not stopped accepting them, but rather local branches have stopped accepting large quantities of them. I even had the luck of going to two in a row that refused about $2000 worth. At the first one, I figured they were just BSing me as this a branch that also lied to me about availability of halves and claimed they could never order them (even though I still buy them from other branches of the same bank). Then the second one I went to was a Chase branch. They were a little better at explaining to me why they can't take them and letting me know what was going on. They were nice enough to call around to their closest branches for me to see which ones still had the ability to count them. A couple did not. Then I started calling around to other local banks and it was about 50/50 responses. This is only a sampling of about 10 banks and is not statistically representative. One of the managers at a 5/3 branch was the one who explained to me that notes from the technician when their counter was updated indicated it would not take $2's OR old style $50's. I doubt all these banks have the exact same model counters and it may only be one model that's not taking old style $50's.
I remember reading on another forum about that the lack of $2 acceptance was an error in the new chip's programming. Supposedly this issue will be fixed at the next firmware update, probably with the introduction of the new $100.
