An unexpected emergency came up recently and we had to break into a piggy bank (by piggy bank, I mean a plastic cereal container that was overflowing with lots of pennies). The coins were something that were out of sight and out of mind, but thankfully this situation brought them back to my memory.

3 Easy Ways To Cash In Your Coins

When it comes to turning coins to cash, there are a number of options out there that quickly came to mind. I just needed to decide what the best option was for our situation.

Option #1: Using Coinstar To Cash In Your Coins

I was looking at the Coinstar machine the other day while waiting in the returns line of our local Walmart. The first thing I noticed was that there was a fee of over 9% to get cash back for your coins! The price seemed a bit hefty to me, but who puts a price on convenience these days?

There is no fee, though, if I was to apply the sum to a Walmart Gift Card. Since I needed the cash, I decided against this option.

Option #2: Penny Arcade

I had an account at TD Bank (back when it was Commerce) and I remembered the Penny Arcade was free for non-customers. It would count your coins and you could take the receipt to a teller for cash.

I called the closest branch to ask if they had a Penny Arcade and the representative informed me that the policy changed for non-customers in 2011 and there is now a 6% fee to use the machine. This was definitely a better option than Coinstar, but I wondered if I could do better.

Option #3: Local Bank

I called one of the banks we use and they accept coins that are already rolled with no fee for current customers. Since I was low on wrappers, my husband was able to swing by and get an envelope full for each denomination for free.

Even though wrapping the coins was a bit tedious, it wasn’t horrid since I did it while catching up on House Hunters ;-). I was able to get the cash I need with no problems.

Bank policies vary, another bank I called said they no longer accepted coins. Other banks accept coins in a canvas bag (unwrapped), and some charge their customers a fee for counting the coins.

If you have coins you’d like to donate to charity, Coinstar and Penny Arcade machines offer that as an option.