Why Doesn't Coinstar Accept Silver Coins?

Cause they don't want to take the risk of other low value foreign coins or more risk of the machine accepting random crap.

So collectors and stackers can get lucky when they check the reject tray! Found many an interesting coin in these machines, including out of my own change that I dump in there. But maybe there's just not enough circulating silver so why bother to complicate the machine?

The answer to the OP's direct question...


...is, "Yes, they could.". Specifically, rather than "anything dime-sized", they could program in two different "coins worth 10 cents" parameters, one for the silver dime and one for the clad copper dime. They have not done so. For reasons why they have not chosen to program their machines to accept silver coins (or the other coins in the above list), you will have to direct your question to Coinstar management. It's their machines, and their policy. All anyone else can do is guess. My guess would be that having two coins with different parameters but the same face value makes the internals complicated. They already have this problem with Anthony vs Golden dollar coins, neither of which are likely to be dumped into Coinstar machines in bulk. To include silvers, they'd need two parameters for nickels, two for dimes, two for quarters and three for half dollars.

My second guess: they aren't programmed to accept gold double eagles for face value either. Because they're not, strictly speaking, "face value coins" anymore - they're collectors items, or items of interest to bullion dealers. They have to draw a line somewhere, and that "somewhere" for them is at Ikes, steel war pennies, and silver coins.

Finally, there's the question of what to do with them. The machine sorts and separates them, so at the end of the day, there's a little tray of silvers to remove from each machine. Where do they go? Back to the banks? Seems wasteful. Would Coinstar sell them off to bullion dealers, for profit? Sure, but would it be good PR if Coinstar "stole" people's silver coins from them for face value and sold them for 1000%+ profit? Coinstar already do this, with company workers emptying the reject trays and disposing of the contents to scrap metal merchants or as they best see fit, but they do so "without knowing" what the rejected things are; they cannot plead ignorance if their machines know exactly what the silver coins are as they are counted. Or should Coinstar get into the bullion dealing business, paying people "fair value" for any silver they deposit? All of these things add complexity to their operation, which can be simply avoided by rejecting the silver coins.

Even coinstar machines have no respect for Ikes.

to the Community!