In the things you learn by chance category (since I don't live in the UK) and is useful for coin collectors to know, there is a new 1 pound coin issued in England, and was put in use recently. It incorporates designs and features to prevent counterfeiting since other pound coins there had a lot of that going on... in this graphic they say one in thirty pund coins in use were bad. So as of last month, all those old coins are no longer legal tender. Of interest is there is supposedly some technology embedded in the coins so that should the design be counterfeited, coin counting or payment machines won't let them pass.
Wow, did they have a lot of problems with fakes? I wish I had some old pound coins for fun but I don't live in Britain. Thanks, Jacob
Expensive for the country to have to totally redesign and introduce coinage that is size and weight different. Fake coins in society erode confidence and cost the country a lot in lost revenue.
I have never found a fake one myself, but it's not something you really look at. I have never met anyone that really cared one way or the other. The old coins can be deposited or changed at any bank and this will probably continue to be the case for years.
Amazes me how often Britain can change their coins and yet we have had the same crappy coins for some, a century. Even Britain can change their metal types quick and we have years of study.
No, there is no new £1 coin, Kasia. This one was first issued eight months ago - and actually the old one is no longer legal tender. There has been some criticism, mostly about the short redemption period, and about some vending machines that did not accept the bimetallic piece right away. https://www.cointalk.com/threads/meet-the-new-one-pound-coin.298717/ https://www.cointalk.com/threads/round-pound-chaos.304517/ https://www.cointalk.com/threads/th...ter-they-cease-to-become-legal-tender.304122/ Some of the rejected shapes and "colors" can be viewed here by the way: http://metro.co.uk/2017/11/22/concept-designs-for-new-1-coin-revealed-for-first-time-7097443/ Christian
There was a real issue with counterfeit pound coins Kasia as even sophisticated vending machines with proximity switches would fail to reject fakes and the bulk of the vending machines worked on weight and dimensions and many gave change. It was also believed that the 1 in 30 ratio was spurious and it was higher. During a radio debate 20 random coins were examined and 5 found to be fake! Imagine 25% of one dollar bills being counterfeit! They were pretty easy to spot because usually the obverse was misaligned with the reverse and even if the reverse was 10 degrees off it denoted a fake. As many were brass they did not "ring" if you dropped them onto a hard surface. Counterfeiting used to be a capital offence on the charge of High Treason and the last two counterfeiters were hung in 1827 for faking George IV Sovereigns. Fake coins may become a thing of the past in the UK because our Canadian Governor of the Bank of England advocates a cashless society. Of course this is because we will all be "safer" but a nice bonus for the Government will be that even a 10 cent purchase will be recorded and tax deducted at source and our sales tax in the UK is a universal 20%. We are blessed with a constant change in our currency as our Royal Mint who are based here in Wales have a commercial business as well as their standard coinage responsibilities and this is driven by collectors. The Mint also sells old coins to collectors but these are at a high premium because they have COA's sold with them and they are usually purchased by new collectors or those simply interested in acquiring some historical artefacts. They are actually doing a service to the numismatics community by stimulating interest in the hobby. If you PM your address I will be pleased to send you a couple of old pounds.
