I was at the bank the other day and I saw a coin counting machine there. I asked about it the lady told me it counts ALL coins. Halves and dollars too! Best thing is that it is absolutely free. You don't even have to be the bank's customer. That is so much better than coinstar because they think they should get 9% of your money. I'll take my change to the bank thank you. No more rolling coins for me. I just wish I had found out before rolling $340 in halves.
There's a bank near me that has the same type of machine. It is so nice not to have to roll your coins and put your account no. on the rolls.
Our banks here want their share for the use of the counting machines. Seems like you get charged for everything anymore. I used to have a collection of savings accounts pass books, including some with coin designs on them. At that time, a minimum of $5 balance was all that was needed. Now, if under $300 at most banks, they dock you and start eating your savings. Needless to say, my collection of passbooks, which numbered 40 at one time, has been reduced to one. I do maintain the savings acount my Grand Father started for me in 1953. The rest are gone, before he banks could confiscate my savings.
Nate you are right but coinstar does provide a service and 9% isnt bad. Consider that their machines take even the most nasty dirty coins and you dont have to worry about them calling you back if the coins are too bad to put back into circulation. I like the service because I put all the nasty coins I dig up up from the ground in that machine. Our bank here makes you put your account number on the rolls and charge you if they discover anything wrong. In the coinstar you put everything in and bingo, money hehheh.
My bank, in New Jersey, also has a coin machine which anyone can use. You don't need an account. I use it every week or so to return my coins and get a $25 box of lincolns and the rest in rolled quarters. Much better then rolling them!
My bank has a machine but it is not to be used by the public. They allow you to drop off coins on Thursdays only and get the cash the next business day. If you are not a member, they charge 10% for the service. I also get a dirty look every time I bring coins in. Not like they have to work hard at it, the machine does the work! Must be taking them away from their coffee.
Accuracy? I wonder if the accuracy of those machines (both CoinStar and the bank machines) is routinely checked. I know it is not precisely the same thing, but recently I took a stack of 95 one-dollar bills to deposit at my bank. Rather than count them by hand, the teller ran them through the bill counter, which on two consecutive passes concluded that the stack was 93 dollars. I pressed the matter, and with a mildly dirty look, the teller counted them out by hand. Sure enough, 95 dollars. She was shocked, showed another teller, and mused aloud "We always use the counter without double checking. I wonder if it is always off." I suspect the mechanism for counting coins is more likely to be accurate than a bill counter. But what do you think? Are the coin machines "completely" accurate? Accurate enough? Likely to be a bit off? The cynic in me also can't help but think how easy it would be to have these machines "fail" to count some coins, even one coin in a hundred. Is seems extremely unlikely that the average user would ever notice, and even if all that went through those machines was pennies, it would add 1 percent to the company's take. Consider the other denominations, and the percentage goes up. Are they calibrated and regulated like slot machines? Has there been a Nightline investigation? We should use some pre-counted piles of coins to verify! Dymaxion
As "user friendly" as my bank is, if I asked them that they would probably throw me and my coins right out the front door. But then again, maybe I WILL ask them if they have ever had their machine checked for accuracy. It will be interesting to see what kind of answer I receive. They also won't accept rolled coins. Is this a common practice among other banks? Afraid you're going to rip them off with rolled slugs I guess.
I have both a coin and currency counter of the types used at banks. The currency counter is usually very accurate. I am astonished at the person who had an error with the currency counter. I have never had a difference of count on a currency counter in ten years. The coin counters are another story. They are very accurate when used properly. It is my observation at many banks that most tellers run the coins way too fast. When you dump in a large number of coins at one time you will definitely get errors because the machine cannot handle it. The coins get misfed into the wrong bags. Coins can fall into the wrong bag giving you more or less than you should get. Also, most people don't realize that they generally pull out any coin that is not U.S. and put it in a 'discard can" and don't tell you about it. On the plus side, the coin counters cannot distinguish between US and Canadians cents (don't try this with the other denominations).
Coinstar is legal theft. I have never paid to deposit coins. I would love to pay people 95% of face value for their US coins.
I'm pulling back this thread to see if anyone could help me locate banks which offer this free coins counting machine service. I'm looking to find one. Hopefully they are not regional banks! Thanks in advance.
Hey, JB. I think it was lawdog that posted a web for a bank. Maybe a PM to him, if it wasn't him, just blame me for being senile . JD
