Topic: Legal Tender in UK? (Read 1189 times)

Thank you! That was the answer I was looking for. Where else did I get the answer?

Yes, at this point we've all invested so much into the problem that I think it's reasonable to demand a followup on what happens, but please don't spread your report over more than:

1 sentence must be contained in 1 post,
1 paragraph of text split into no more than 3 posts,
2 paragraphs of text split into 5 posts,
...

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but how I read the above chart is that the smallest denomination he could use and it have to be accepted is the 20p coin, since the debt is £10.00.

Yes, the suggested split keeps those individual amounts below their individual limits, but the total debt of £10.00 is what's being paid, not 4 separate debts of £0.20, £0.20, £5.00, and £4.60.

At this point, however, I think you've wasted far more time - and suffered far more frustration - determining how small a denomination you can give than will be inflicted on the recipient by being handed either assortment of change.

?
You keep getting the answer to your question:

Yes it does mean you could pay them back like that. And if they don't accept it and take you to court you would win the case, because it is legal tender.

Don't be so absurd. Why would you interpret 0.22p in such a way? Perhaps if I expressed it as £0.22p you would understand me?

I guess I'm never going to get the answer to my question...

That's genius! LOL

0.22 of a penny is £0.0022.

You can't pay someone a fraction of a penny. Debts that involve fractions of the smallest currency are usually rounded to full multiples of the smallest unit. E. g. if your phone company charges 1.79 ct. for a one-minute call, it would be rounded to 2.00 cents.

I think there's a difference between banks and shops. If you actually happen to sit on a large amount of coins (e. g. because you're running a grocery store and all customers pay with coins), then the bank is supposed to be the place where you deposit them. Some banks also encourage their retail customers to deposit the content of their piggy bank to their savings account. Naturally, they don't like to count that by hand which is why large branches often have counting machines for that purpose. The small branches, however, often don't have counting machines so they have to count coins by hand.

However, in most jurisdictions, legal tender doesn't mean that people have to accept absolutely anything that is legal tender. For example, vending machines never accept 1ct and 2ct coins; Given that all vending machines work like that, I would doubt that this practise would be declared illegal in court. However, in Finland, stores have to accept 1 ct and 2 ct coins even though such small coins are not used in Finland. Most people use to throw these coins into the trash because they don't know what to do with them; The postal service however, uses to ship their 1 ct and 2 ct coins to Germany in order to get rid of them.

By the way, you don't have to use cash in order to piss people off. I recall that there was a case over here in Germany where someone was angry with his lawyer (probably because he lost a case). So he chose to pay his lawyer with ~20 000 wire transfers, each amounting to 1 cent. The lawyer was charged €2.50 for each of these transactions. (The client probably had an account with unlimited free wire transfers.)  Now the lawyer reacted to this payment by sueing his former client. He won the case; the court decided that what the client did was an "immoral damnification". He was ordered to compensate the transaction fees he had caused, which he also did. He refrained from splitting up that transaction as well.

You can. They don't have to accept it, but if they don't, and especially if they then add more charges, you will have a good enough case to take them to small claims court, where you will be able to make them accept it and cancel the extra charges. You'd want proof you offered it in a legally acceptable format i.e. video evidence or a letter from them declining your payment offer or something. Don't be too surprised if small claims make you pay the court costs for wasting everyone's time though! But if you really, really want to piss somebody off it might be worth paying the court costs (around £40 I think) just to do it.

It doesn't answer my question because that was my post....

I asked if I can settle debt in a combination of the legal tenders. I know I can settle the debt in court with 10 £1 coins but I want to give as much change as possible!

I think this pretty much answers your question.  The person who you owe £10 legally could refuse your offer but if he took you to court whilst he may win the case, he would have to accept payment from you with these coins if you so chose.

I thought the total for 1p and 2p was a combined 20p.

I think you are misunderstanding my question.

Say I want to settle a debt of 0.22p.....

Am I able to pay with 20 x 1p coins and 1 x 2p coin legally?

Yes if they don't accept your remittance offered in £1 coins + the rest of the change allowed, and subsequently take you to small claims court to get the money off you, the court would be satisfied that you had offered to settle the debt using legal tender and that they had refused it. If you try to give them 1p, 2p, 5p etc. coins only, you'll get a rollocking.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/shortcuts/2012/may/15/what-can-you-buy-just-with-1p-and-2p

No place of business is obliged to accept your money as payment. They do not HAVE to sell you anything. Legal tender refers to the settlement of a court ordered debt. For example I loaned out 1BTC and the person I loaned it too didn't pay back I could take them to court and they could pay me in any legal tender they like and I cannot refuse it.

Ahhh so that's how it works, I did see an article where a guy paid for college with 1 dollar bill once.

Thanks salty. I know I can settle any debt with the minimum of £1 up to any value but it is only a small debt and I want to just wind the guy up. Could you read my OP and see what you think?

No, that link outlines what rights you have. They *have* to accept:

£5 (Crown) - for any amount

£2 - for any amount

£1 - for any amount

50p - for any amount not exceeding £10

25p (Crown) - for any amount not exceeding £10

20p - for any amount not exceeding £10

10p - for any amount not exceeding £5

5p - for any amount not exceeding £5

2p - for any amount not exceeding 20p

1p - for any amount not exceeding 20p

If you offer to settle a debt by the above divisions then a court of law would rule that you had offered a reasonable settlement. This law came about because people used to pay with small change for the lulz. An acquaintance of mine did it in the 1980s, he bought a brand new Range Rover with buckets full of £1 coins.

Unfortunately shops/banks and the like have the right to reject this sort of thing I think but the law might have changed since I last looked.

IANAL: But that's what they're saying on there, so yeah it appears so to me. However,you can take (by prior arrangement) bags of coins to a bank to be cashed up, and I've done this in the past for loads of coppers so I guess it's down to if they're willing to accept the coins as a settlement of the debt. You never know, they may be a penny slot junkie!

bump