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Quick update on buying coins at face value from the Royal Mint using 3V

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A couple of weeks ago, I ran this article on buying 50p coins at face value from the Royal Mint.

To be honest, it was written as a bit of fun.  And the fact that the ‘free postage’ code I gave had expired before the post actually appeared did not help!

However, a new code for free postage is now available – OLDNPP

At worst, you can now buy £50 of 50p coins for £50 and get them delivered to your house for free.  Because the Royal Mint takes Visa and MasterCard, you can earn a few miles for your effort and get £50 nearer any sign-up bonus you are working towards.

It gets more interesting if you buy 3V Virtual Visa cards from Tesco, though.  The Royal Mint takes these cards, so you can immediately cash them out – whilst netting yourself 150 Clubcard points (360 Avios) for every £50 of 3V cards you bought.  (See here for more details on 3V).

Since you are limited to roughly £50 per order – you can only buy 4 of each different coin – and since someone needs to be at home to take the delivery (I assume they don’t go through your letterbox), I still put this in the ‘bit of fun’ category.  But it could prove useful nonetheless.

Comments (47)

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  • ComeFlyWithMe123 says:

    Without chasing, I just received this email

    Dear Mr ComeFlyWithMe123

    Thank you for your recent order with The Royal Mint.

    Due to an unusually high demand in our London 2012 Olympic 50p range of coins we are experiencing some delays affecting our regular despatch timescales. All online, telephone and postal orders placed for London 2012 Olympic 50p coins will be processed and despatched as soon as each coin becomes available.

    All orders will be delivered by the end of June.

    Thank you for your understanding and I apologise if this has caused any inconvenience.

    Yours sincerely ,

    Allyson Bowden
    Customer Service Manager

  • James Ward says:

    Just got an email from Royal Mint:

    “Due to an unusually high demand in our London 2012 Olympic 50p range of coins we are experiencing some delays affecting our regular despatch timescales. All online, telephone and postal orders placed for London 2012 Olympic 50p coins will be processed and despatched as soon as each coin becomes available.

    All orders will be delivered by the end of June.

    Thank you for your understanding and I apologise if this has caused any inconvenience.”

    HfP is to Royal Mint what Delia Smith is to cranberries!

    • Rob says:

      …. Or Tesco is to 3V!

      • James Ward says:

        Maybe you should just change your name to Delia.

        I think that’s what I’ll call you from now on. 😉

        • Rob says:

          She used to live on my road, actually, when I lived in Docklands ….

          • James Ward says:

            Ah, that explains it all. Some of her magic rubbed off, clearly.

  • Greenpen says:

    There are now only five sports available on the Royal Mail website; all the others are listed as not available.

  • Rocky says:

    Just got this email from The Royal Mint.

    Are they planning on sending me a envelope full of coins? If so even better so I don’t need to unwrap them……………

    Dear Mr Rocky

    Thank you for your recent order with The Royal Mint.

    Due to an unusually high demand in our London 2012 Olympic 50p range, we have had to reproduce a large amount of the designs. Please be aware that some of the 50p range of coins that were ordered will be dispatched without the outer retail packaging.

    Thank you for your understanding and I apologise if this has caused any inconvenience.

    Yours sincerely ,

    Allyson Bowden
    Customer Service Manager

    • James Ward says:

      I just got this email too and I’m not best pleased as I was planning to flog them on eBay, where they’re going for up to £2.99 a piece. Presumably they won’t have the same value without the commemorative packaging.

      • Rob says:

        Still worth at least 50p though!

        • Rocky says:

          I had a delivery of 50p coins today and what is missing is the plastic wrapping, the coins come just in the cardboard.

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