TORONTO -- Change can be hard to deal with -- especially when you have $800 worth of it, and the bank says it won’t accept it.
This is the predicament Julien Perrotte is in. He collected up his loose change for over a year before rolling up his loonies and toonies to bring to his local bank.
But it turned out he couldn’t deposit the coins.
“The problem is, the bank don’t want my money,” he told CTV News Montreal.
Laurentian Bank no longer accepts coins, the teller told him. He said the teller recommended he simply spend the $800 of rolled coins in stores and restaurants.
“Like I’m gonna go to a restaurant and pay with my $50 worth of coins,” Perrotte said.
A spokesperson for the bank explained to CTV News that they were simply trying to keep up with the times by eliminating tellers who would handle coins. As customers use debit and credit to handle more and more transactions, the bank decided to only take cash deposits through its ATMs.
Although the issue is centered around just one bank, Perrotte’s situation circulated, and struck a chord with others who fear that coin-less banks could become more widespread. One man launched his own protest, standing outside the Laurentian Bank with a sign that said “Respect your clients.”
“Not recognizing legal tender ... There’s a serious problem and the government has to intervene,” he told CTV News.
It’s valid to fear that coins could be on the way out -- production of the penny was stopped in 2012 -- but most banks still accept coin deposits, and the Royal Canadian Mint is still pumping out toonies and loonies to this day.
As for Perrotte, he’s planning on opening a new bank account somewhere else that will take his rolls and rolls of coins.
