Having Money to Make Money
June 26th, 2007 | by rachel |
Unless you are very unusual, you have loose change around your house, car, purse, etc. By some estimates, there is as much as $10 billion is loose change sitting in American homes right now. That’s a lot of money to be gathering dust instead of earning interest! Before you get too busy looking for your share of that money, you need to keep this in mind…
If a coin is not in circulation, it is not doing its job. If it is stuck in your purse or your sofa, it is definitely NOT in circulation. To get it back into circulation, it has to be “processed”. That is a fancy way to say that it has to be counted and rolled and turned in to a bank.
COIN PROCESSING OPTIONS
1. Manual Processing – separating, counting, rolling and labeling coins by hand. This is totally free except for the time that it takes for you to do the actual work. You can get the wrappers free by asking for them at the bank and you need to check to see what type of labeling your bank requires when you deposit them. If you want to make this process easier and quicker, you can invest in a battery operated coin sorter.
2. Free Coin Processing – Some banks are beginning to make coin processing machines available for their customers to use free of charge. In some cases, banks WILL charge a fee for non-customers to use these machines. If you are interested in finding a “free processing” location near you, look at the following web site www.theunderstory.com
3. Automated Coin Processing – If you want the quickest, easiest way to convert your change into cash, there are for profit coin processing machines in retail locations throughout the country. When you use these machines, you will pay a service/processing fee (usually 9-10%). After the counting is complete, you will get a receipt for the cash amount due to you. Depending on the company that owns the machine, you may have the option to turn your cash into a gift card and/or to donate the cash amount to a specified charity. If you are interested in learning more about how this process works, read about CoinStar and Coins 2 Cash.