According to recent reports people in Britain have £510 million lying around in unwanted foreign coins.

On average we have about £17 in unused foreign coins lying around our houses that we never do anything with. So what can we do with them? One idea is to give them to charities. Oxfam and Barnardos have recently starting taking in your unwanted coins.

The coins are being exchanged in currency converting companies by the charities, which is in turn supplying them which a much needed boost in funds. The current economic downturn has ensured charities get less donations as people worry about their favourite charity- their own family. To donate money when you have the cash t is one thing, but to do so when money is tight is very commendable, but will they need that money themselves in the long run? Those people themselves may end up needing charities themselves- while that point is hopefully slightly exaggerated, I think you understand what im driving at.

So donate those unwanted foreign coins to charity. Smaller coins are harder to exhange and you dont really get much back for them -not unless you’ve got alot of them at home.Most of the time the coins just end up sitting at the bottom of our draws and wallets unspent.

The post office is taking them in for charity, so pop down there if you have a spare five or ten minutes. Some flights have started accomodating money collection bags to get your coins off you before they even begin to start cluttering up your house.

If giving your unwanted coins to charity appeals to you then get in contact with the charities. Some charities will send you collection packs so you can collect all the unwanted coins in your local area, and if you collect over a certain weight they will arrange for the money to be picked up so you dont have to send the coins off yourselves.