Non-motoring > b***** Coppers. Miscellaneous
Thread Author: R.P. Replies: 84

 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
Paid for some milk at the local supermarket. Inserted my lovely £5.00 note in the auto check out - the change spilt out. £3.00 in coins and the rest in coppers...!! Now I rarely carry cash these days. Usually around a fiver in £1.00 coins in my work trousers (don't bother with a wallet in work time) - any more and I use my phone to pay, otherwise I use contactless cards and I subscribe to my daily paper so a voucher takes care of that as and when. So what do I do with these coppers...?

Is it time to get rid of them from circulation ?
 b***** Coppers. - rtj70
Could pay them into the bank I suppose ;-)

Or keep them and feed into the same till next time to pay.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Fri 22 Jun 18 at 21:54
 b***** Coppers. - No FM2R
Depends on your life, I guess.

For me they sit in a large container by the door and the children are welcome to help themselves.
 b***** Coppers. - Duncan
Get right back to the root cause.

Buy your milk from Aldi. A box of 12 x 1 litre Tetrapak cartons. Long life, fully skimmed. Each of those boxes should last you about a fortnight. When you have got through those, repeat. Pay for it with a credit card, no change. Job jobbed.

There is a nice new Aldi in Chertsey, not far for you to go....
 b***** Coppers. - Roger.
That is exactly what we do! Aldi UHT skimmed milk is good and cheap and British.
Special treat time is whole fresh milk, especially if it's in the reduced section at Sainsbury or Tesco. (SWMBO is still on a bit of a diet kick!)
I picked up a Yeo Valley whole organic milk, reduced, t'other day and it was particularly good.
Last edited by: Roger. on Tue 26 Jun 18 at 13:39
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
>> That is exactly what we do! Aldi UHT skimmed milk is good and cheap and
>> British.

with Profit going to the Germans.
 b***** Coppers. - Roger.
Bearing in mind Sainsbury's ownership structure these days profits there, partially at least, going to the arabs of Qatar. What's the difference? (apart from geography)
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
>> Bearing in mind Sainsbury's ownership structure these days profits there, partially at least, going to
>> the arabs of Qatar. What's the difference? (apart from geography)
>>

Difference is that you insist the germans are screwing us over.
 b***** Coppers. - PeterS
Any coins less than £1 end up in a charity collection box!
 b***** Coppers. - Driver
Just being pedantic, the maximum legal tender for coppers is 20p. Of course you can't argue with a machine!

www.royalmint.com/help/trm-faqs/legal-tender-amounts/

 b***** Coppers. - henry k
I swap them for cash at one of my local small shops
 b***** Coppers. - sooty123
Normally just use them to pay at self pay tills.
 b***** Coppers. - Runfer D'Hills
>> Any coins less than £1 end up in a charity collection box!...

Similar, brown ones go into whatever charity box is nearest, silver ones kept for parking meters.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
I agree that the 1p and 2p coins should be phased out. They are now just a nuisance. We should do as Canada and other countries have done, i.e. make all cash transactions roundable to the nearest 5p. Electronic and cash transactions remain the same.
Last edited by: CGNorwich on Fri 22 Jun 18 at 22:32
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
you get them home, you stuff them in a tin, then once a year you take them to the coin counter at tesco and cash them in for notes, then buy wine with them

60 quids worth last year
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
i thought you paid everything by card
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
My wife doesn't, I do except for the once a year copper coin collection....


Edit, but thats a good point, it was about 110 quid the previous year, so it looks like the copper coin collection tin is headed for the exit
Last edited by: Zero on Fri 22 Jun 18 at 23:27
 b***** Coppers. - Bromptonaut
Three pots by front door. One holds £1/£2, second silver and third coppers. First and second replenish the parking money purses in the cars (and used to be change for my daily paper when I was commuting). Coppers go in the machine at Sainsbury as does excess silver.
 b***** Coppers. - neiltoo
Don't the supermarket machines charge a percentage?

The one in my bank doesn't, but I rarely get in there.

8o)
Last edited by: neiltoo on Sat 23 Jun 18 at 11:32
 b***** Coppers. - Robin O'Reliant
When I was doing cash on delivery I needed to carry small change. The local secondary schools were a good source of coppers, a walk by one after chucking out time often yielded twenty or thirty pence on the floor or in the gutter. Apparently it is the thing to chuck one and 2p pieces away to prove how cool you are.

Saved me queuing at the bank, anyway.
 b***** Coppers. - bathtub tom
Those that don't carry cash may be interested in a local story of a village of 5K plus people who lost their internet yesterday due to roadworks severing a fibre cable.
Local shops, petrol station and pubs couldn't service credit/debit cards, neither did the ATMs work.
Don't know when it will be re-connected and it's the weekend.
 b***** Coppers. - Driver
>>Those that don't carry cash may be interested in a local story of a village of 5K plus people
>>who lost their internet yesterday due to roadworks severing a fibre cable.

I tend to use cards but dread the day when we are forced to go cashless. I don't like the idea of "big brother" monitoring everything.

I have a gardener who gets paid by cash, its only £15 a week and I guess the cost of using credit / debit cards would cost a fair bit in equipment and processing costs. I get a statement from him at the end of the summer with details of work and payments.

I always keep about £20 of pound coins and silver in the car for car parks and enough for a tank of fuel, food and budget hotel stay, hidden in a locked container bolted in the boot, in case I get caught somewhere without access to card payments or I forget my wallet.

 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
We've reasonably regularly used our phones when neither of us have any other form of payment on us. Handy backup - I used to carry an emergency fiver for years. Don't bother now other than in work. I reckon (well not just me) that we'll be effectively cashless before long. My sister has paid her window cleaner for years by paypal.
 b***** Coppers. - PeterS
Our window cleaner emails an invoice and I pay using internet banking. The cleaner also prefers to be paid that way. Even the chap that does the hedges and other gardening stuff prefers payment direct to his bank account.

I thought I might try paying for the MINI in a few weeks with my phone, so see what happens ;)
 b***** Coppers. - Zero

>> I don't like the idea of "big brother" monitoring everything.

You should be used to it by now, its been happening for a while now.

>> I always keep about £20 of pound coins and silver for a budget hotel stay,

Not sure travel lodge take cash.
 b***** Coppers. - sooty123
>> Those that don't carry cash may be interested in a local story of a village of 5K plus people who lost their internet yesterday due to roadworks severing a fibre cable.
>> Local shops, petrol station and pubs couldn't service credit/debit cards, neither did the ATMs work.
>> Don't know when it will be re-connected and it's the weekend.
>>

Big problem for the businesses suffering, much less so for the cashless customers.
 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
There are other villages/towns within reach, I'm a retail tart - I'll shop anywhere. The only exception is the village shop for a paper and their eggs..
 b***** Coppers. - No FM2R
>>I'm a retail tart

5 days a week, so am I. At the weekend then there are a few selection criteria depending on the moment;

Can I walk to it?
Does it have a burger van in the car park?
Does it serve alcohol?

It is rare that I'll go somewhere at the weekend that doesn't fulfil at least one of those criteria.
 b***** Coppers. - martin aston
There were stories in the press a few weeks back that copper coins should be withdrawn. Mrs May quickly shot it down.
Personally I think these coins should go but its increasingly difficult for politicians to make such decisions. Social media would jump on it, the tabloid press would be full of pictures of tearful kids who could no longer buy a single sweet from the last corner shop in Nowhereshire.
The other parties would make capital out of it (all of them do this) and start a "Save the People's Penny" campaign.
Its not worth the hassle.
Last edited by: martin aston on Sat 23 Jun 18 at 19:02
 b***** Coppers. - sooty123
Excellent post MA, some astute observations.
 b***** Coppers. - PeterS
How long ago did the 1/2p disappear? I vaguely remember it... and, in real terms, what would it be worth now...?
 b***** Coppers. - Driver
>>There were stories in the press a few weeks back that copper coins should be withdrawn.
>>Mrs May quickly shot it down.

>>Personally I think these coins should go but its increasingly difficult for politicians to make
>>such decisions.

I agree.

Copper coins are a PITA, but is the real reason to avoid inflation, which is higher than the Govt. want at the moment?

Are copper 2ps still worth more as scrap?
 b***** Coppers. - bathtub tom
Please, no-one mention the quarter of a penny thing. The mods won't like it.
 b***** Coppers. - MD
>> Please, no-one mention the quarter of a penny thing. The mods won't like it.
>>
No fartingh on here BT.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
Their scrap view is pretty low. They are not solid copper alloy but steel in a copper jacket.. you can check that with a magnet
 b***** Coppers. - MD
An attractive view.
 b***** Coppers. - rtj70
>> Are copper 2ps still worth more as scrap?

As already said, they are not copper any longer. That would make the coins worth more as metal than the monetary value.
 b***** Coppers. - Bromptonaut
>> Those that don't carry cash may be interested in a local story of a village
>> of 5K plus people who lost their internet yesterday due to roadworks severing a fibre
>> cable.

Same in a much smaller village (but a tourist centre) Thursday evening on a Scottish Island albeit an unexplained outage affecting one restaurant rather than a known cable severance. Fortunately the cash machine next to the tourist office still worked. Otherwise, in absence of old fashioned slips/carbon paper as fall back they'd have been collecting IOUs.......
 b***** Coppers. - Roger.
......so why do petrol stations insist on using fractions of a penny in their pump pricing ?
Totally dishonest con trick, I think; but who, these days, is thick enough to fall for it?
127.4 p per litre in Sainsbury's locally. Bah Humbug!
Last edited by: Roger. on Tue 26 Jun 18 at 13:46
 b***** Coppers. - Zero

>> Totally dishonest con trick, I think; but who, these days, is thick enough to fall
>> for it?

Well as you are not buying your petrol anywhere in rounded up prices, you are falling for it.
 b***** Coppers. - Roger.
There is no choice, so your argument is demonstrably false.
I have never seen a petrol station offering rounded up/down pence, or pounds, as a matter of pricing policy.
Last edited by: Roger. on Tue 26 Jun 18 at 14:19
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
>> There is no choice, so your argument is demonstrably false.
>> I have never seen a petrol station offering rounded up/down pence, or pounds, as a
>> matter of pricing policy.

I quote.

"Totally dishonest con trick, I think; but who, these days, is thick enough to fall for it?"

Make your mind up.
 b***** Coppers. - Bromptonaut
>> ......so why do petrol stations insist on using fractions of a penny in their pump
>> pricing ?
>> Totally dishonest con trick, I think; but who, these days, is thick enough to fall
>> for it?
>> 127.4 p per litre in Sainsbury's locally. Bah Humbug!

The price is 127.4 and that's what you pay. Ten litres costs you 12.74. Fractions of a penny are rounded up or down according to third decimal.

In what way is it dishonest?
 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
It's not is it. You see the price - the big numbers are your baseline for what you pay. Currently around 126ish around here - I read 126, in reality I know it's 126.8 but if the next station shows 127.4...it's more expensive so I go to the first one..
 b***** Coppers. - Roger.
It's marketing. It niggles :-)
A sofa at, say, £1499 is really £1500, so why not be up front?
 b***** Coppers. - Robin O'Reliant
£1499 is easy enough for anyone to understand.

One of the reasons pricing which ends in 99 (Whether pence or pounds) is used is to make sure the cashier has to ring the price on the till in order to give the customer change. Otherwise they could put the money straight in their pockets.
 b***** Coppers. - Manatee
Marks & Spencer generally price in round pounds, presumably they don't think it hurts them.
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
>> Marks & Spencer generally price in round pounds,

Or half pounds, lot of stuff is £xx.50.


Except in the food hall.
 b***** Coppers. - Manatee
I think the last pork pie I bought (don't tell the boss) was £1.00.
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
>> I think the last pork pie I bought (don't tell the boss) was £1.00.

Not just any pork pie then.
 b***** Coppers. - Robin O'Reliant
>> Marks & Spencer generally price in round pounds, presumably they don't think it hurts them.
>>

It is something that is gradually changing, possibly due to far fewer cash purchases being made now.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
So pay £1500 then and tell them to keep the change or put it in the charity tin. You always give the impression you would walk a mile to save twopence. Glad to see you are losing your obsession with price.
 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
www.dailypost.co.uk/news/north-wales-news/caernarfon-power-cut-blackout-electricity-14830646

Oddly the cashless apocalypse struck a local town today.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
I'm not sure apocalypse is quite the right word for 200 homes without power for a couple of hours.

;-)
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
Really? I thought it was welsh for "candle"
 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
Shops lost their payments system.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
The Modern Apocalypse

This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but with loss of all electronic retail payment facilities

Apologies to T S Eliot
 b***** Coppers. - Pat
>>In what way is it dishonest?<<

Simply because you can't go and buy exactly what they are offering for sale.

1 litre of fuel @ £127.4.

Pat
 b***** Coppers. - Manatee
>> >>In what way is it dishonest?<<
>>
>> Simply because you can't go and buy exactly what they are offering for sale.
>>

But you can, you just have to buy some other litres with it. And regardless it will still cost £1.274 per litre which is the advertised price. And even if it was £1.28 per litre you'd still have to buy more than one.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich
That argument would make your gas,electricity and water suppliers dishonest too. Nobody ever buys one litre of petrol.
 b***** Coppers. - sooty123
You can't buy a litre of fuel anyway, pretty sure that the minimum amount is two or three litres.
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
I'm going to try an experiment next fillip time and put exactly one litre in and see what the pump price says. Ie rounded up our down. I guess up.
 b***** Coppers. - smokie
They usually show the exact price as far as I recall. Not sure Weights and Measures would approve if they didn't.
 b***** Coppers. - tyrednemotional
>> They usually show the exact price as far as I recall. Not sure Weights and
>> Measures would approve if they didn't.
>>

I'm racking my brain, but I don't think I've seen a (recent, digital readout) pump that displays the current amount in anything but full pence increments.

As Z says, it may round up or down for exact litres. (I do hope it isn't down, otherwise Roger will start filling up a litre at a time........... ;-) )
 b***** Coppers. - smokie
I retract my earlier comment, I've Googled some images and they don't seem to show fractions of a penny in the cost panel

e.g. www.alamy.com/stock-photo-display-on-a-filling-station-fuel-pump-68057613.html
 b***** Coppers. - Driver
Had this issue a while back.

Petrol was something like 99.8 pence per litre. When I put in exactly 50 litres the pump read something like £50.10!

I queried this with the staff at the garage who just shrugged their shoulders so I contacted Trading Standards who checked and advised that the pump was in tolerance and that I had filled up with fuel between display resolutions of the pump's meter, though the dispensing of fuel was correct. Something like 50.005 litres dispensed whilst the pump could only display 50.00.
Last edited by: Driver on Wed 27 Jun 18 at 10:06
 b***** Coppers. - Zero

>> the dispensing of fuel was correct. Something like 50.005 litres dispensed whilst the pump could
>> only display 50.00.

That infers its actually dispensing by price, not volume. Which at the end of the day I guess is not a problem. You get what you pay for.
 b***** Coppers. - R.P.
That explains it. In hot weather the pumps dispense more fuel - so I assume that's factored in as well.
 b***** Coppers. - commerdriver
>> That explains it. In hot weather the pumps dispense more fuel - so I assume
>> that's factored in as well.
>>
My physics is pretty rusty but I though a given weight of fuel would take a greater volume in warmer weather and a smaller volume in colder weather.
If I have that right, does that not mean you actually get less fuel in warmer weather although it has a greater volume.

I thought I had read somewhere that F1 cars fuel is kept and dispensed at a low temperature for just this reason.
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
Is the calorific value of fuel by weight or volume tho? do you end up with the same bang for your buck>?

(you don't because the engine is less efficient in hot dry weather, you may get more fuel, but less MPG)
Last edited by: Zero on Wed 27 Jun 18 at 11:18
 b***** Coppers. - VxFan
>> If I have that right, does that not mean you actually get less fuel in
>> warmer weather although it has a greater volume.

I'm sure I've read somewhere that if you fill up first thing on a cold morning, you'll get more fuel for the same price than later in the day when it's warmer.
 b***** Coppers. - Bromptonaut
>> I'm sure I've read somewhere that if you fill up first thing on a cold
>> morning, you'll get more fuel for the same price than later in the day when
>> it's warmer.

True if fuel is dispensed at ambient temperature. Fact that it's stored underground and in bulk will mean temperature at the nozzle output is much less variable. Car's tank should have sufficient 'spare' volume to allow for any thermal expansion that occurs after filling up.
 b***** Coppers. - Manatee
You get smaller amount of fuel when it is hotter, because the same amount takes up a bigger space and you buy it and pay for it by volume.

It's weight that counts for energy content. Think moles* and Avogadro.

The SI units, not the beasts.
 b***** Coppers. - CGNorwich

>>
>> It's weight that counts for energy content. Think moles* and Avogadro.

That’s just a hypothesis.
 b***** Coppers. - Robin O'Reliant
>>
>>
>> I thought I had read somewhere that F1 cars fuel is kept and dispensed at
>> a low temperature for just this reason.
>>
I believe the fuel in F1 cars is dispensed and measured by weight so that the usable amount is not distorted by temperature.
 b***** Coppers. - bathtub tom
There's a warning doing the rounds about how you shouldn't fill your petrol tank full during this hot weather because it could explode! The comments about exploding cars in Africa and suchlike are a joy to behold.

However, I had an Austin Princess with an enormous triangle shaped tank (80L IIRC) and once filled it, then parked facing uphill. The point of the triangle was forward and the filler neck was at the rear. I presume the air bubble at the front of the tank expanded in the heat and pushed copious amounts of petrol out of the filler neck. Lesson learned.

Austin Maxis also had the filler cap situated low down behind the N/S rear wheel. Similar could happen if parked on a steep camber.

Why did we ever buy BL cars?
 b***** Coppers. - MD
BL = something liability. Awful stuff.
 b***** Coppers. - bathtub tom
In their dying stages they changed the name to Austin Rover Group (ARG).
Didn't make it up, had one and it was in the registration document.
 b***** Coppers. - No FM2R
And then they changed it to simply "The Rover Group".

And thus ended 40 years of gross incompetence.
Last edited by: No FM2R on Thu 28 Jun 18 at 01:30
 b***** Coppers. - Zero

>> Why did we ever buy BL cars?

we stopped and they went bust
 b***** Coppers. - Robin O'Reliant
>> However, I had an Austin Princess with an enormous triangle shaped tank (80L IIRC) and
>> once filled it, then parked facing uphill. The point of the triangle was forward and
>> the filler neck was at the rear. I presume the air bubble at the front
>> of the tank expanded in the heat and pushed copious amounts of petrol out of
>> the filler neck. Lesson learned.

That happened on a Mk1 Capri I owned. The binmen knocked one morning to tell me about the petrol dripping out past the filler cap.
Last edited by: VxFan on Thu 28 Jun 18 at 13:19
 b***** Coppers. - smokie
That's reminded me - my binman pointed out my charge cap was open last week, and I don't think I had pressed the button to open it. I meant to mention it at the service last week.

But it's not happened again. And luckily no electricity had flowed out :-)
 b***** Coppers. - slowdown avenue
saw a tv program, where a lad had done his downstair flooring in 2p coins .thought it was really cool
 b***** Coppers. - Zero
>> saw a tv program, where a lad had done his downstair flooring in 2p coins
>> .thought it was really cool

Not if the sun was streaming through the windows on it it isnt.
 b***** Coppers. - martin aston
but at least its a nice change.
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