Morrisons bans £2 coins after foreign currency scam
Morrisons will not be accepting £2 coins at self-service checkouts in the West Midlands until further notice, after discovering some customers had been paying with foreign coins of similar weight.
Morrisons has discovered that customers had been using coins from Thailand and Iran as substitutes for £2 coins in its self-service checkouts, as they’re a similar enough weight and size to fool the machines.
The 250 Iranian rial coins being used are worth less than a British penny; 87,000 rial would be approximately equivalent to £2. The 10 Thai baht pieces found are worth slightly more, at around 18p.
Self-service or no-service?
Designed as a convenient alternative to queuing for a manned till when you only have a few items, automated checkouts have become somewhat notorious for getting ‘stuck’ during the process.
This isn’t the first time self-service machines have made the news as people take advantage of them – a survey by VoucherCodesPro.co.uk earlier this year revealed that frustrated shoppers who were getting sick of waiting for an item to register had just walked out of the store with it instead.
A temporary measure
Morrisons is now refusing to accept £2 coins in self-service checkouts at some stores in the West Midlands, where they found the problem had originated.
A spokesperson told the Daily Mail that this was a temporary measure while the problem was solved, and it wasn’t expected that resolving the issue would take long. Morrisons has offered its apologies for any inconvenience caused to customers.
Have you ever tricked a self-service machine? Are they open to abuse? Let us know your thoughts in the comments box below.
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Comments
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I work for one of the large supermarkets. You know the ones, try to fob you off with a few cheap deals on milk, bread etc to make you think they are cheaper than the rest, pay near to minimum wage whilst work you like a dog. Well the self serve tills will never go, and for one reason. You only have to pay 1 wage for 8 tills. That saves 7 wages 24 hours a day. Multiply that by however many stores and the supermarkets are quids in. More profit = more dividend for already rich shareholders!
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I quite agree, electricblue, shopping at lunchtimes and early evenings when supermarkets are packed with people from the local offices, is an absolute nightmare. No wonder British industry is going to the dogs if these shoppers are examples of people who work in it!
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If the machines were simpler, they would still be a whole lot smarter than the shoppers who delay everyone else by paying with card, usually with much fumbling and theatrical delay and then counting out a fistful of silly coupons. Those of us who don't want our every purchase tracked are happy to keep paying by cash. Being able to count, we can even manage to hand over payment in a couple of seconds. Perhaps the Islamic Republic of Iran, having failed in nuclear ambitions, is now trying to undermine our shopping experience and currency, one coin at a time. I'm also not sure about 'lovely checkout ladies' either, I'd say that is just a manifestation of poor memory and some personal fantasy and certainly from someone who has never shopped at Tesco.
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27 June 2014