Use Coinstar for Free

Written by nickel - 21 Comments

I’ve never been one to pay for things that I can easily do myself, so I’ve always rolled my own spare change rather than cashing it in at a Coinstar machine. But according to a commercial that I saw the other day, you can now have Coinstar count your change without the service fee, which runs close to 10%. There is, however, a catch… You have to take your cash in the form of an Amazon.com gift certificate. Actually, after a bit of digging, I discovered that you can avoid the coin-counting fee by opting for gift cards from a number of other merchants, as well, including Borders, Hollywood Video, Linens ‘n Things, Pier 1 Imports, and Starbucks. So if you’re too lazy to count your own coins, and too cheap to pay a fee, consider getting a gift card from a Coinstar machine.

Published on December 19th, 2005 - 21 Comments
Filed under: Miscellany
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Comments (scroll down to add your own):

I’m too lazy to count my change and too cheap for the coinstar. My method for using change used to be to drop it in the tolls (surprisingly, they do take pennies…) but now I have ez-pass so I can’t do that. Instead, I put it in a fire engine piggy bank or in my truck’s change holder, and then I spend it when I know I’m going somewhere that will use it. I buy egg sandwiches on a regular basis that are $2.45, so I almost always make sure I bring in 45 cents with some assortment of change (preferably not quarters as those are better used for laundry…)
Comment by Blaine Moore — Dec 19th 2005 @ 7:26 am
A lot of banks will count change for free, check if your local bank will do it. I know my girlfriend’s bank, SunTrust, does it.
Comment by jim — Dec 19th 2005 @ 9:06 am
My credit union does this for free. Just bring in a jar of coins and they dump it in.
Comment by mbhunter — Dec 19th 2005 @ 3:33 pm
Yep, my bank has their own Coinstar machine for you to use. (TCF)
Comment by Chase — Dec 19th 2005 @ 6:37 pm
In the DC-metro area the Chevy Chase banks have Coinstar machines that are free for everyone (account holders and non account holders.) Of course, after you dump your change you have to take the receipt and wait in line to see a teller.
Comment by Jeremy — Dec 19th 2005 @ 7:38 pm
I take my rolled-up coins to my bank branch (very twentieth century) … they place them in special bins which supposedly measure the size to determine if I counted correctly, and they deposit the cash into my checking account. No fees.
Comment by Flexo — Dec 19th 2005 @ 10:08 pm
I remember reading that these machines often mis-count the coins — so you usually pay their feee PLUS lose some in the “counting”. So even if the fee is now cut, you may not get 100% based on how accurate the counters are.
Comment by FMF — Dec 20th 2005 @ 7:17 am
I always wonder about coin counting machines, esp. at casinos and stuff, you can make big bucks missing one coin out of a thousand and 99% of the time the consumer would have no idea.
Comment by jim — Dec 20th 2005 @ 1:32 pm
I used to save the quraters for when I had to do laundry but that was years ago!

I make a point of saving my cions until the jar is full. That typically means I have a hundred dollars or so ready to be cashed. Then we just do the counting and rolling while watching a little TV. Not too bad. On my recent visit to my bank to deposit the coins, it took them almost two weeks for the deposit to finally clear. Not sure what was up with that.

Neo
Comment by Neo — Dec 20th 2005 @ 3:39 pm
I roll my own (coins) except for pennies. I’ve been dumping those in the coinstar, but I’m going to check with my credit union to see if they’ll do it for free. Thanks to above commenters for the info.
Comment by D — Dec 20th 2005 @ 8:21 pm
We actually keep our change so when our kids get dollars as gifts, we can convert the money to change. Then they can more easily divide up their funds into their 3 piggy banks (giving, spending, savings).
Comment by FMF — Dec 21st 2005 @ 12:14 pm
I actually used this system to help with our Christmas shopping for this year. Our local credit union offers the service for free if you take coins to the teller, but this is hard to do during working hours. Going to the local grocery store at 8:00 pm at night was more convenient. With the Amazon.com gift card, it counts the money, dials up a modem, and then generates a receipt. I was able to go home and redeem that certificate immediately.
Comment by David Smith — Dec 23rd 2005 @ 11:19 am
Well, that works out conveniantly well, David.
Comment by Blaine Moore — Dec 23rd 2005 @ 12:05 pm
David — How accurate do you think the counter was? Any idea?
Comment by FMF — Dec 23rd 2005 @ 2:04 pm
Hey this was a part of my Christmas money. I did in in November and got an Amazon gift certificate for the kids shopping.
Comment by Frugal Momma — Dec 24th 2005 @ 5:09 am
If the machine was intentionally cheating me, I didn’t notice or would never have noticed. This sounds to me like an opportunity for a SCIENCE EXPERIMENT!

i.e., the only way to know for sure is to precount your change and/or take the same quantities to multiple machines.
Comment by David Smith — Jan 3rd 2006 @ 12:59 am
I think someone’s done that test before (I recall reading it). Google it and see what you come up with.
Comment by FMF — Jan 3rd 2006 @ 8:23 am
That’s good news. I have a couple thousand dollars worth in change that I’ve been saving up over the past few years. My Bank won’t count it for free and I don’t want to pay 10% of it to coinstar or spend the time rolling it myself.
Comment by Eric — Jan 12th 2006 @ 10:41 am
This article reports an unscientific study on the accuracy of CoinStar machines. CoinStar wasn’t perfect (2/5 of its trials experienced mishaps) but neither was it biased either way (one trial lost a couple coins, the other mysteriously added some loose change) so there seems little to be worried about
Comment by Ryan — Feb 11th 2006 @ 12:03 am
I’ve used the Coinstar machine twice at my grocery store. It miscounted the coins both times. To be sure, I would slide a few coins in at a time in the amount of .30. The machine would take a few quarters, dimes, pennies here and there but not add it to my total. I didn’t go back.
Comment by Tina — Dec 8th 2006 @ 11:17 am
heh heh.
Ok, I shall give out my trick…
Only pennies go in the JAR - then then to COINSTAR.
Nickels n Dimes: Put these in MOST vending machines - and then press the coin return. viola. The machined returns in quarters!!
Quarter i use for tolls, laundry, pool machines in bars, casinos, etc etc
Comment by richard — Jan 19th 2008 @ 4:56 pm