New £20 notes

[C J Snarzell]

The new £20 note went into circulation on Thursday (20th).

Has anyone actually received one yet?

The note will now be on polymer like the £5 & £10 notes. The new note will feature the artist JMW Turner and the first notes to have the signature of chief cashier Sarah John who took over in 2018.

I do think the notes are awesome when they are brand new and I start developing a bit of OCD in retaining them. However, when the notes have been used a couple of times they start to get very annoying in that once they get folded they don't lie flat and quickly lose their appeal.

I do prefer the paper £20 that have been around since 2007 and these will probably go out of circulation later in the year. The new £50 will be released sometime in 2021.

I see the usual idiots are already cashing in new £20 notes on e-bay that have the unique serial numbers of AA00...!!! Pathetic.

CJ

 

[ainsworth74]

I see the usual idiots are already cashing in new £20 notes on e-bay that have the unique serial numbers of AA00...!!! Pathetic.

I would argue that the real idiots are the ones who are paying over face value for the notes with 'special' serial numbers...

 

[scotrail158713]

I would argue that the real idiots are the ones who are paying over face value for the notes with 'special' serial numbers...

Yep. A bit like the recent discussion on here regarding “special” 50p coins - a £20 note is worth £20 to me.
(However if someone offers me a stupidly over the top price for a “special” one I’ll gladly accept it )

 

[DaleCooper]

If I get a £20 note out of an ATM I use it at the first reasonable opportunity (not to buy a packet of crisps from the corner shop) so I don't really care whether it's paper or polymer.

 

[scotrail158713]

However, when the notes have been used a couple of times they start to get very annoying in that once they get folded they don't lie flat and quickly lose their appeal.

If you feel it’s worth the effort - I find placing them under a heavy object (book, box etc) for a few hours flattens them out.

 

[Calthrop]

I see the usual idiots are already cashing in new £20 notes on e-bay that have the unique serial numbers of AA00...!!! Pathetic.

I would argue that the real idiots are the ones who are paying over face value for the notes with 'special' serial numbers...

Yep. A bit like the recent discussion on here regarding “special” 50p coins - a £20 note is worth £20 to me.
(However if someone offers me a stupidly over the top price for a “special” one I’ll gladly accept it )

In view of the opinion held by many of the general public, of the hobby which we share and to which these Forums are dedicated -- for me, glass houses and stones come irresistibly to mind here !

As it happens, I know a keen banknote-collector, who is also a railway enthusiast: in fact this guy does not pay money over face value, for items which he collects; but he is obsessively keen on the whole banknote thing -- and in most departments of life, he is anything but an idiot. It's easy and tempting to despise eccentric pursuits, harmless to oneself, which one however has no interest in -- and to extend the contempt, to the people who engage in them -- but, on reflection, less easy to justify such sentiments.

 

[thejuggler]

I suspect I'll be a while getting one. I withdrew £50 in first week of January and today was the first time I have had to spend any of it as I couldn't pay by card.

 

[ComUtoR]

I've got about £200 in my pocket in tenners. Been trying cashpoints for the past couple of days. Still not got one :/

 

[Mag_seven]

The new £50 will be released sometime in 2021.

Hopefully it will be accepted widely as the current one isn't due to the large numbers of forgeries in circulation.

 

[ComUtoR]

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/statistics/banknote

£20s are by far the most forged note. My local Kebab shop has a forged Polymer £5 pinned up

 

[trainmania100]

Can't stand the new notes, they're so slippery and easy to stick to your phone in your pocket and when you reach for your phone the note blows away because it comes out your pocket with the phone , also a pickle to count the notes too they stick to eachother etc

 

[Kite159]

I've got about £200 in my pocket in tenners. Been trying cashpoints for the past couple of days. Still not got one :/

Give it a couple weeks before more cash points are modified to carry the new notes (which I believe are smaller than the old notes)

 

[ASharpe]

I've got about £200 in my pocket in tenners. Been trying cashpoints for the past couple of days. Still not got one :/

About 10 years ago it was unheard of to get a £5 note out of a cash machine.

Even if the machine was loaded with £10s you would have needed to pick an odd starting value to get one.

This all made sense to the people paying to deliver cash into the machines, but didn't get enough lower value notes into circulation.

Now if you withdraw £20 you are unlikely to get a single note and have a good chance of getting two 5s and a 10. You might have to withdraw as much as £40 at once to stand a chance of getting a 20.

 

[DaleCooper]

Now if you withdraw £20 you are unlikely to get a single note and have a good chance of getting two 5s and a 10. You might have to withdraw as much as £40 at once to stand a chance of getting a 20.

I always withdraw £30 and nine times out of ten I get a £20 and a £10.

 

[Ashley Hill]

I received my first ones yesterday. Spent them in the pub last night,didn't think to look at the serial numbers. Im as unimpressed as I was with the £5 and £10 note. The question is shall I keep an old £20 note as a souvenir ?

 

[furnessvale]

I received my first ones yesterday. Spent them in the pub last night,didn't think to look at the serial numbers. Im as unimpressed as I was with the £5 and £10 note. The question is shall I keep an old £20 note as a souvenir ?

I kept 10 consecutively numbered one pound notes in mint condition from the last but one edition.

I've still got them. I'll bet they're worth at least £10 now.

 

[The_Train]

I once read a story of a person selling 4x 'special edition' 50p pieces for £1.......

I don't really have an opinion on the new notes as I don't usually have any in my wallet There was actually a rumour fest in a city just up the road from me recently that it was being infested with counterfeit £5 notes. It all stemmed from the fact that people were finding that they could scratch certain parts of the 'counterfeit' notes but the Bank of England came out to state that this was just down to wear and tear. I thought these new notes were supposed to be indestructible?

 

[furnessvale]

I once read a story of a person selling 4x 'special edition' 50p pieces for £1.......

I don't really have an opinion on the new notes as I don't usually have any in my wallet There was actually a rumour fest in a city just up the road from me recently that it was being infested with counterfeit £5 notes. It all stemmed from the fact that people were finding that they could scratch certain parts of the 'counterfeit' notes but the Bank of England came out to state that this was just down to wear and tear. I thought these new notes were supposed to be indestructible?

I don't think anything is indestructable but I think they will last longer.

I have noticed, IMO they don't seem to take kindly to being folded.

 

[Peter C]

I don't think anything is indestructable but I think they will last longer.

I have noticed, IMO they don't seem to take kindly to being folded.

I've seen many an online video/TV clip where people have discovered that scrunching up/repeatedly folding a plastic note can cause the note to tear easier. But as you say, nothing is indestructible.

-Peter

 

[GusB]

I've seen many an online video/TV clip where people have discovered that scrunching up/repeatedly folding a plastic note can cause the note to tear easier. But as you say, nothing is indestructible.

-Peter

I'm certain that I recall seeing a clip on YouTube where the note was dipped in liquid nitrogen and then hit with a hammer. Definitely not indestructible

 

[Peter C]

I'm certain that I recall seeing a clip on YouTube where the note was dipped in liquid nitrogen and then hit with a hammer. Definitely not indestructible

Ha! What a way to lose £20

-Peter

 

[DaleCooper]

Ha! What a way to lose £20

-Peter

Not if you Sellotape the pieces back together.

 

[Domh245]

It was only a fiver that was destroyed, although I'm sure it still holds for the other polymer notes! As for what to do with the destroyed money, the smashed one was kept as a souvenir (less a bit that got lost!), although he could have always submitted a form to the Bank of England to get reimbursed for it, which is more than could be done for some of the other notes in the video!

 

[Tom B]

£5 notes were once available in ATMs - they seemed to go in the early noughties, and have reappeared in the last few years. I believe one of the issues with fivers previously is that so few of them go back to the major banks, so they are in a worse condition than the others.

I was given an old English £1 note about 10 years ago in change - I was in a shop in Edinburgh and, because of some mix up, their change order had been delivered from the bank in £1 notes instead of coins. In amongst the usual RBS ones was an old BofE.

 

[johntea]

I always find it strange how spending £20 'cashless' feels like nothing, yet withdraw £20 and it feels like rather a lot of money!

 

[crablab]

yet withdraw £20 and it feels like rather a lot of money!

Yeah, people say they find it easier to budget with cash as they can "feel" how much they have. Personally, I find cash a hassle and easy to lose track of. But I do work for a bank so probably a bit biased

 

[Peter C]

Not if you Sellotape the pieces back together.

Good luck with that!

-Peter

 

[krus_aragon]

I had a ₤20 out of a cash machine on Saturday morning. I found that the purple of the new polymer banknote is far more vibrant than the old paper note I had to compare against it, but the use of gold portions offsets that nicely.

 

[Shimbleshanks]

Off topic I know, but I recently came back from Northern Ireland with two Ulster Bank £20 notes. I was surprised how easily I was able to spend them, in a central London restaurant and a coffee shop in St Pancras; in the past I've had real trouble shifting them as they're less often seen the the Scottish notes and people were deeply suspicious of them. (In the 1970s they'd have called the Bomb Squad...)
Mind you there is also a Danske Bank version of the NI notes which from past experience arouses a lot more suspicion. (Danske Bank owns one of the high street bank chains over there and haven't even bothered to translate their name.)

 

[SteveP29]

Can't stand the new notes, they're so slippery and easy to stick to your phone in your pocket and when you reach for your phone the note blows away because it comes out your pocket with the phone , also a pickle to count the notes too they stick to eachother etc

I find a wallet usually helps, notes in there, coins in one front pocket, mobile phone in the other, never been let down yet.

I've seen many an online video/TV clip where people have discovered that scrunching up/repeatedly folding a plastic note can cause the note to tear easier. But as you say, nothing is indestructible.

-Peter

Remember Tomorrow's World putting spoonfuls of cottage cheese on a CD, cleaning it and putting it in a player and it worked perfectly.
Somebody at home tried it, ruined the disc