Coins = Notes with Coinstar! (Coinstar)

Member Name: Absy_Baby

Product:	Coinstar
Date:	16/09/09 (174 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Quick, you get money in a non embarrasing form.

Disadvantages: Costs money (but doesn't everything)?

Coinstar a really simple concept that I'm surprised hasn't been around for longer. I used to see the Coinstar machine in Asda by the door and saw people putting in change and for some reason after seeing the receipt that came out, I presumed you then spent the money/voucher in store.

After discovering a large bag of 1p's, 2p's, 5p's, 10p's and 20p's at work a colleague and I decided the best way to change it in to proper (notes) money would be to visit a Coinstar machine, so we went to our local Tesco's after going online to confirm that you can indeed change the voucher for cash at the customer service desk.

Off we went to the local Tesco, when we arrived we saw the Coinstar machine in full swing with another customer, so we queued patiently behind him and waited our turn. He was there a while, must have been saving his pennies for a long time.

The one complaint I would have here, is there Coinstar machines are quite large, and look like an ATM/cash point. This is quite open and the screen is quite large and visible to those around you. My colleague and I respect people's privacy so we avoided looking in the direction of the screen, but someone who was obviously interested was the security guard, the cheek of him, he walked from about a metre away, standing side on to the machine, over to us, leaning over to have a look at how much the guy in front had put in.

We were utterly disgusted at this, and I was going to complain but after mutterings under our breath he backed off. He didn't do the same to us. Lucky for him!!

So we got to the machine, which as I said is very large (I think this could perhaps be changed slightly so the screen could be lower and more concealed, but it obviously needs the size to store the coins).

The machine literally is a touch screen, so you touch to say start and then proceed to put your coins on a grill that can be lifted at one end, this means the coins slide down one end where there is a slit and the coins go inside to be counted. On the screen there is a running tally of how much you have and in what coins, it's fun to watch it go up, especially if like us you guessed beforehand what the total would be.

The machine doesn't like to be overloaded so I wouldn't put too much on the grill, we did, and it kept saying on the screen: please wait while we catch up. Which is fine but leads me to question, did it count it all? I think so but you never know.

The Coinstar machine does say on the screen prior to starting do you agree to the terms, and you must press yes before you proceed. The main thing you need to agree to: Coinstar will take 7.9p out of every pound you put in. Well you didn't think the service was free did you? I think 7.9p is quite a lot but at the same time, you are paying for a service and it's a good and quick one.

I don't know if anyone is like me but I begrudge paying money for things like this, even though I know you get nothing for free and it is fair. It is nice that you don't actually see on the screen how much Coinstar makes from your transaction, the total on the screen, is what you will get. Coinstar's money is deducted so you don't feel bitter (or is that just me)?

Coinstar spits out all the foreign coins and old tender so if you can't be bothered to separate it before, this will do that too.

Once you have finished with Coinstar you press the collect money button on screen and it prints a receipt, on the receipt is the total you have made, and also what Coinstar have, so you can see how much you've been charged for the service.

So with our receipt for £31.67 in hand, we proceeded to the customer service desk where the piece of paper was swapped for some Great British pound notes!

I would recommend this service; even I would use this with my own money if I didn't have the time to count it. I mean it is quick and easy and when you think about how long counting coins, bagging them up, and then taking them to the bank, queuing in the bank (which is enough to put anyone off) then you do save time for a relatively small cost.

Summary: A great way to change all that change up!