Today I spent 6 presidential dollar coins for gasoline. The woman behind the counter gave a smile and a look of interest when she noticed that I was pulling the coins out from my pocket. So I started thinking, after almost of a year of spending these I have never really gotten any odd reactions from people as many anti-$1 coin articles would make you believe I should be getting. I got a couple of looks of curiousness mixed with astonishment at Christmas time, but that was it. People either seemed pleased to get them or have no reaction at all. (Maybe it's because I don't spend a lot of them and I usually spend them in the same types of places )

So when you spend your US $1 coins let us know and share with us what kind of place(s) you used them at and if you have gotten any sort of noticeable reaction from the person or people. I am a little curious as to how many people use them on this board and if people have the same fun as I do when spending them or if they're actually more of a hassle???

(If anyone wants to piggyback recent $.50 stories feel free to as well as I may pick up a roll from my bank soon for spending )

I don't spend the $1 coins, I really don't care for them really. But I spend $2 bills just about everyday. I have gotten mostly favourable comments about them, including that they are seeing more and more of them now.

I spend $1 coins and half dollars as well. I've never gotten anything but positive responses. I don't overdue it though. If something is say $6.75, I might pay with a $5.00 bill, a dollar coin, a half dollar and a quarter. It starts a number of conversations about folks collecting them and saving them for their kids and such.

Of the few rolls I had of Pres coins there were only a couple that were good enough for the album.
The remainder I used to buy my hubby a crankup emergency radio.
The young lady who helped me wasn't sure she should take the coins but the store owner intevened and sort of smiled at me... like the 'whatcha doin this time?' look.

It does seem odd that I never get the $1 coins back in change. Nor do I get the 50 cent coins.
Hmmm... wonder who in this little town is hoarding all of those.
There isn't a bank in our milkstop town where you can get new rolls of any coins, except the Pres dollars, and that was just one time.

Little towns, gotta love them... so peaceful... so far from anything.

Corky

$6 bucks = about 2 litres over here.
I paid £1.14 a litre the other day which = £ 5.25 approx a gallon or $10.50 so stop complaining and sort out your green footprint.

I assume that dollar coins are a rather rare sight in the USA then?

In the UK we have the opposite situation. One pound notes where withdrawn in 1983 and replaced with coins. Only the Royal Bank of Scotland now issue them. It is rare to see them in circulation. I spent four in England last week and the girl didn't even bat an eyelid. Then again this was just across the border. Manchester I'd guess would get you funny looks and London would probably flat out refuse them, the people there don't get out much.

I do have a number of five pound coins to spend though, I guarantee I'll have a hard job getting rid of those

EDIT: £1.14 a litre!? Tell me that was diesel!

Only spent them once before. Shopkeep flipped them over to make sure they weren't loonies, then took them.

Yes, they are. Nobody really uses them. Our post office gives them back in change, at least their vending machines do. A new law passed that is forcing many vending machines to be able to accept them and dispense them as change. So maybe this will increase their usage.

The curious part of that legislation is that the post office recently announced that they will no longer be dispensing the dollar coins as change. Perhaps it is that when people like me got them, I saved them for my next trip to the window at the Post office and blew them along with my $2 bills to the grumbles of the postal clerks. Today I have to send out several pieces of registered etc mail, and will blow my stash of $2's.

Back in 1979 when they released the Agony dollars, the Post Orifice was the main outlet for the distribution of the coins as change, and not popularly so.

I haven't used them yet but maybe I should, I would love to get a grand response! lol. I live in a small town, They might have to get on the internet to make sure they're real coins, lol.

Or worse yet, they could call the police to determine if you are trying to pass off some counterfeits.

Well, I just tried to spend a five pound coin.

The shop was busy and had just been victim to a shoplifter. When I asked if they would take it the woman said "I've never really seen one of those" and given the situation I didn't push it

I think I'll have a better chance in Edinburgh. Especially in a fast food place staffed by eastern European students.

Gotta give it to the BRM for making the £5 coin, used to be a 25p crown. Now its value increased 20 fold and it is less likely to be spent and thus results in a seignorage profit for the BRM.

My wife has a box with 50 or 60 dollars in it. Our daughter gets them in tips and feels funny about spending them. I took SBAs to a Bay Area coins show last January to pay my admission fee ($5). I got a strange look, some hesitation, some fidgeting as the guy tried to figure out where to put them in the cash box, but he finally accepted them. I found that amusing since it was a coin show. Next, I'll have to dip into my wife's stash, but I think she knows just how many are in there!

I love to spend the dollar coins, and I so prefer them to the dollar bills. Just try stuffing a worn out bill into the soda machine, as opposed to dropping a single coin into it! Much satisfaction there.

I don't remember where I was spending the coins, but I do remember one cashier nearly snatching the coins out of my hands, and inspecting them closely. Her only comment was "Are these Real?" I have no idea if she thought they were really gold, or if I was just trying to pass some bad counterfeit money... but it was an interesting reaction.

I never saw a dollar coin Sacagawea in my life but I can tell you here in europe it is different the smallest folding money is 5 euro so you need 1 euro coins for nearly everything from getting a shopping mall cart to paying the parking meter
The reverse is true
Virtually nobody accepts a 500 euro bill and nearly nobody accepts a 200 euro bill
You might try 100 euro and be lucky but since the bank dispensers only spew out 50 bills and make up the difference only in 20 bills it is a struggle to keep changing 50 euro bills every day
We don't have many people accepting direct moneytransfer below 20 euro ( bankcard with chip and code)

In England the ignorant cashiers are very annoying, they don't tend to accept £5 coins, Scottish banknotes and even query the £2 coins with different designs on. So frustrating!

I keep the best commemorative issues of British coins for myself!

Clive.

If it wasn't for the post office we wouldn't even had the $1 coins in existence for all these years. Do you have a link to this that I can read about? I know there are plans to do away with the stamp vending machines which would greatly reduce the amount of $1 coins needed.

You should totally jump on the bandwagon!

Seriously, though you might make someone's day with these.

I will never, ever attept to spend one of those dumb things again. For some time I tried to distribute them but now I give up. At a restaurant I left several at the table for a tip. SEVERAL. The waitress said loudly as I walked away from the table, "Sir, you left a bunch of your kids play money on the table". We have commuter trains. I tried to use one there but the conductor said "Hey, see this coin changer? Do you see any slots for those stupid things?" At a Walmart a cashier said "Now what the @%#$#% and I supposed to do with those?" Called her head cashier who said don't you have any real money? I know those are real sir but we just are not set up for them yet. How about using them in about 10 years."
One friend of mine also attempted to carry a lot of them. Wore a hole in his pocket so that ended that with him.
No, I think I'll pass on the usage of those dumb things.

I read today that switching to dollar coins would save the US $500 million a year. That's ten million dollars every year your state could be spending on other things. I would be firmly supporting the dollar coin.

I actually think its a pretty nice coin. Lighter than the pound coin, and arguably less bulky.

WOW! I have never heard anything like that before. What part of the country are you in that nobody wanted to take them?

Yeah, the funniest thing is that the government thinks the problem is that people don't like to use them, it looks like the real problem is store owners either don't know they exist or don't have a spot in the cash drawer for them. lol!

Meh, I'm not too worried about saving the government money, we have to be realistic here, it'll never get back into our pockets. If you're interested in what I'm saying you should do some reasearch on the United States paying farmers NOT to farm. That's right, there are farmers that are paid to not grow crops with our tax money, so they can keep the price of the product higher. Anywho, I don't want to get into political debate; you're completely correct, this would save our government loads of money. Paper money has such a short lifespan. And as much as people may not like them, it makes more sense for people to have them, they're worth more than paper money because of the copper content. Paper is worth, well... what we believe it's worth... lol, no real world value.

Which is why so bleeping many of the foods we all consume now are sourced in Mexico and China.

I use them almost daily in the Pop machines at work.

The machines don't give me a hard time.

The same happens here in the European Union. I know it seems like a daft concept but there is logic and reason behind it. Helps to keep the economy stable and reduces wastage. You'll properly find the farmers are also expected to take on a number of countryside duties. Now personaly however I feel we'd be better paying the farmers to produce the surplus anyway and simply ship it off to the third world for free (It is right next door to us after all).




It wasn't until watching an episode of Frasier recently that I even realised that your vending machines would have to take notes. Here in the UK none of them do. The only time you would ever see such a thing is on a niche vending machine that dispensed something of high value, or a change machine. It wasn't till two years ago when Tesco and Asda introduced their self-service checkouts that I had ever used one.

Funnily enough, because the UK has so many note designs and BoS recently issued a new (second) set, many of the machines cant remember every possible note. Some of our Scottish Parliament members recently complained because one of the canteen machines wont accept the new £20 note

Right here in Illinois. We are not talking about some small, out of the way place, this is a busy, conjested area of the country. Notice I said commuter train. That would indicate a massive commuter system. And those baby dollars are as popular as the plaque.

That happened here with the new $20's, then the new $10's and will again in march when we get the new $5's. Last night I had an issue with a automated checkout that wouldn't take $2's. The ones in Wal-Mart and Meijer do, but the ones in Kroger don't.

Amazing how so many people say how to save our government money. Then there are so many, many things like the not to grow policy that waste our money right back. Now don't forget all the other things like subsidized gas and oil for the poor farmers. Massive land tax subsidies.
Think of how you hear of the expenses hammers for hundreds of dollars they spend.
Now on Feb 19, 2009 we are force by the government to go all digital for TV's. This means if you use an antenna, it is now useless. So our government will send you two coupons to pay for the converters. Where did they get this money? Was it just laying around? So you want to save them money by using baby sized dollars. Yeah, right.

It is really petty minded to think "in my opinion the government waste money, so I'm going to force them waste even more"

Every other western country lives quite happily with 1 and 2 denomination coins. There was a reason we choose to go that way. A huge bulk of the coins circulating in the UK today are original mints. Notes on the other hand (especially low denomination such as 1) tend to ware out in a matter of months. Ignoring the cost, think of the environmental impact of producing and distributing all those notes constantly. What a senseless waste.

Anyone who claims to have gone to Canada or Europe and ended up with "twenty pounds of coins in my pocket" is a bloody idiot, try spending them instead of pulling out a tenner for every transaction. It is very rare that you should ever end up with more than four single denomination coins. You're dollar coins are quite compact anyway!

It's not that I say "if they'll waste any way, why not force them." My attitude is, if I like the coins, I'll use them. If I don't, then I won't. No matter what our decisions are, the government is still going to waste money. Look at the Fed cutting the rate, what does that do? Print more money! I, in no way, disagree that switching to coins is better for the environment, better for the government, but I won't be false minded in thinking that the money the government saves will come back to me. All of the saving will be pocketed and spent. What I'm saying is, if you use these for any other reason other than convenience, do it for the environment, not because you think the savings will be passed on to you. It won't be.

Chicago is supposedly a big user of these in their mass transit system, at least that's what I gathered awhile ago from reading this on the web. Of course, I imagine that means the mass transit automated machines probably use and dispense them as frequent users are probably quite fond of them.

Now I am very curious whether my supermarket's automated express lane will accept $2 bills. I didn't know the government invested anything in the $2 bills so they would be machine readable.

Funny, I never actually considered the environmental impact of the wasteful $1 bill. Who knows, maybe in 20 years they'll switch over to the coin in the US and all these dollar coins we are collecting now may actually be worth something because the $1 coin of the future will be nothing like the one today.

Bearing that in mind, if these coins become valuable, imagine what paper dollars would be worth. I better start buying up silver notes, lol.

I have 20 uncirculated sequential £1 notes that I got from the bank the other day. Since they are only issued in Scotland (and are rarely seen circulating, nobody wants them!) most people south of the border and abroad think they are rare.

Did actually find a special issue one in a batch last week too.

Agreed. Problem is that in some countries people tend to think of coins as something basically worthless - you get them back in change, and later put them into some piggy bank or a jar. Perfectly right for the country they live in, of course. This attitude seems to be common not only in the US - it was also an issue in Greece, Italy and Slovenia before the cash changeover.

Once you start using coins like you use notes, that is no longer a problem. But a tourist from the US visiting a euro or sterling destination, for example, will probably still have this mental image of "coin = low value" in mind, as that is what applies in his/her everyday life back home. Sure, even on a quick trip you will know that the €1 (or £1) coin you have in your pocket is worth roughly $1.50 (or $2) in US currency. But we all have our habits that we are not very likely to change when "away" for a couple of days. For example, I am used to copper-nickel coins having a higher value than brass coins. Duh, that is not the case everywhere in the world. And yet ...

Christian

RBS issues them as advertising, that way they keep their name and their logo in your pocket at all times. BOS and CLY gave them up back in 1988 and their fivers are the smallest notes issued. In NI only one of the banks, I think Ulster Bank issues even a £5 note, the rest issue the £10 as their smallest notes.

The only time I saved larger denomination coins was in France and Germany, where I saved most of the 100FF and 10DM coins because they were silver. But on one occasion, in Munchen, I spent one of the 1972 10DM coins to the apparent shock of the cashier, who basically suggested I was a fool for spending it. But I am sure she saved the coin from the register that day and I made her day. While in Netherlands I made sure to get rid of the 5fl and 2.5 fl coins at the airport, not a hard task since it is so pricey anyway. But I admit, on my last trip to France I did come home with a baggy full of minor centime coins, same in Ukraine when I came home with a baggy full of kopeikas, and China where I even have some Yuan coins and quite a few paper notes, some of which are only worth less than a cent.

I got a NI five pound note last year, had to look closely at it. It was bright blue and made of plastic

Must have been a Northern Bank fiver, they issued them in polymer back in 2000, and had a Space Shuttle on them. Northern Bank is owned by Danske Bank, a Danish bank.

A plastic bill?

Yep, not as uncommon as you would imagine. All Australian banknotes since 1988 and New Zealand ones since 1999 have been plastic. In fact they have a little transparent window on the notes too.

That sounds like play money.... or the money of the future! Which I guess would be now for some.

Wow, I can't believe I've never heard of this. I'm glad you guys told me or else I'd be arrested.

Clerk: okay, and here's your change.
Kris: [very stern look] Quit Joking, give me my change.
Clerk: That is your change.
News reporter: And earlier today, an inept Amercian freaked out on a clerk today for quote "Giving me some @$%$^#$ kind of monopoly money."

A guy at work couldn't get the pop machine to take his dollar bill and asked if I had one to exchange. I handed him a new dollar coin. He examined coin coin for several minutes before he used it to buy his pop.

Several minutes??? Did he say anything to you during this time or was it an awkward silence?

Back in the 1980's when the United States was printing "web" $1 notes I got a full pack of them from the bank. (I used to get a pack of $1 bills every Friday to search for stars, low serial #s, errors, etc...)

I eventually spent them because the web notes were extremely ugly and looked like a bad photocopy. That $100 pack of notes is now worth $2500+.

Keep your Scottish notes and say hello to my friends Camera Obscura in Glasgow.

Not stupid coins at all, more like the people you have encountered are stupid. For soem reason here in the UK the £2 is sometimes questioned in cornershops(Kwik-E-Mart style shops) & Petrol stations (Gas stations for you Americans ) and this is mainly due to the fact that they are the places you are most likely to get fake £1 coins. Not accusing them of anything but a local shop near me has a staggering amount of fake ones.

The USA seems to be the only country that really has a problem with this, God only knows why, here in the Uk, Canada, Australia, New Zealand & Euroland there has been no problem yet some in the US still can't fathom (sp) out that there is a $1 coin, honestly it really is a better move, could you imagine £1 notes over here now? the £5 notes are in bad enough state as it is, no wonder they stopped minting the £1 notes in 1983 & withdrew them completely in 1988