No I'm certainly not an expert, but I am most familiar with Lincoln cents than other coins, and I know next to nothing about coins that aren't American or Canadian.
If the bank wont' you can send them in yourself for redemption, assuming they have restarted the program again, I'm not sure if they have.
Last I checked it had to be a minimum of a pound submission, readily identifiable as u.s. coinage, clean and free of debris, and sorted by denomination and if they don't like it they can refuse to do it. But yes they supended the program. They basically only wanted to exchange bent or cut coin that wouldnt vend not dug or corroded coins. Every time they've suspended it its been because people were sending in pounds of blanks or unrecognizable circles of metal trying to scam the system and the shut it down and refine the criteria. At this point its basically only clean coins that are bent or cut but otherwise easily identifiable as legal u.s. coinage.
No, it's not. And yeah DarkRage, I do know. We changed it because way too many people were using the edit function as a way of getting around the forum rules - way too many times. Ya see, Peter and I have been doing this, running and or moderating coin forums, for a looooong time, over 20 years. And along the way we've learned a lot, mostly from making mistakes. But then that's what you're supposed to do with mistakes, learn from them. For example, have any of you ever looked at this ? https://www.cointalk.com/threads/coin-talk-rules.34131/ And I don't mean you just read the rules, I mean really looked at that page. In particular this part of that page - Coin Talk Rules Discussion in 'Introductions' started by GDJMSP, Feb 22, 2008. What does that information tell you ? What it should tell you is that prior to that date - there were no written rules for members to read and follow. And yet the forum started in Sept. of 2002. So for 5 1/2 years, no written rules for members to read and follow. And trust me, it was a mess at times. Trying to regulate things, control things, keep the peace and maintain order - it was a job that simply couldn't be done. So rules had to be written, and posted where everybody could see them, read them, and follow them - or suffer the consequences. There are reasons, good reasons, why the rules and CT policies are what they are. But primarily they're all what they are so we can provide a civil, family friendly, environment where people who love this hobby can share it with others of a like mind.