Whether you've been between jobs desperate to make the most out of spare change lying around or simply ever had the misfortune of entering a Walmart, then you are most likely famaliar with this jolly green giant of a machine. The CoinStar machine, as well as similar coin sorting machines, are typically found near customer service or the exit of a super market. The function of these machines is to quickly sort and count a large volume of coins and convert it to either a cash voucher, or a gift card. In the case of cash vouchers, most coin sorting machines will take around 5%-10% off of your total deposit as a "service fee." For all intents and purposes, they are a rip off UNLESS you opt to get a gift card in exchange for your coins, as they typically don't charge a service fee on those. However 9/10 the gift cards they offer kind of suck in my opinion, but if you're really lucky they'll have an Amazon one. I've found that most Winn-Dixie grocery stores offer this option. As for the "free money glitch," it is important to understand that most standard machines are calibrated to accept standard US pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, half dollars, and small type dollar coins. Through a variety of sorting methods, including size, weight, and magnets, non-standard coins and items are spit back out into the reject slot. In fact, the machines are prone to spitting out perfectly fine/normal coinage as well. As a result the most common types of coins you can find are misc foreign, particularly Canadian and euro. Where this really works in your favor is when someone unknowingly deposits silver U.S. coins into the machine. The machine isn’t calibrated to accept these coins due to the weight differences between modern copper-clad coins and pre-1965 silver coins. I's quite a quick and easy task to check the reject slot, I highly encourage everyone to give it a try at their local grocery store, unless of course you're doing it at a store that I frequent, in that case fuck off I got dibs! But anyhow, I'll try and update this with any finds.
October 2024 
1951 US silver quarter and a 40% US silver half dollar (left) 1926 France 50 Centimes Chambers of Commerce (right)  |