Put your old pound coins to work for charity
30 July 2019
The Charities Aid Foundation is urging people to donate their old pound coins to good causes.
The plea comes after it was revealed that £145 million worth of old-style pound coins were still in circulation after they were discontinued in October 2017.
New 12-sided bimetallic £1 coins were introduced to combat forgeries but there are millions of old-style coins still sitting in the country’s piggy banks, change jars and down the back of the UK’s sofas. They cannot be spent in shops but can still be redeemed at banks or given to charity.
CAF has found that if just 5 percent of those coins were donated to charities – or about £7 million – it could:
- Fund 9,655 portable machines through the Tiny Tickers charity that can help detect heart defects in new-born babies in the UK
- Enable Save the Children to provide food for more than 50,000 Syrian families for a month
- Provide 116,000 toilets via a project run by Toilet Twinning that helps poor communities build toilets, have access to clean water and learn about hygiene
- Fund Samaritans to keep their help lines open for those struggling to cope for 33,654 hours
These are just a few examples of where the money could go.
CAF’s Ben Russell said:
“Rather than making a special trip to the bank, why not drop those out-of-date coins into a charity collection instead?”
“Those old coins add up and will make a real difference to charities that deliver vital services across the UK and around the world.”