Most Swiss today use cards or Twint and Co. with digital payment. But still: everyone still has a jar full of coins somewhere. As a nest egg. Or because too many coins in your wallet are annoying. It is heavy and takes up a lot of space. So go with it in a container.
Or to the bank! But that’s easier said than done. For example, Postfinance has shut down 43 deposit machines. With them, you can easily turn the small change into a clearing and pay the money directly to your postal account.
The act of rolling requires patience
“It’s very expensive and time consuming to run Postfinance with deposit functionality,” says Postfinance. In addition, the number of users has been decreasing in recent years. “Due to negative profitability, it was not worth keeping Postfinance running its deposit machines.”
Now customers have to drab and cunningly turn coins into paper. These are available free of charge at the checkout. As a look test shows, the rolling process – exactly 50 pieces should always be packed – takes patience. The coin is flipped over and over again. Work starts all over again. But once you’ve done that, go to the post office counter, where you can buy a 50 one-franc fifty bill. Up to 20 such cash deposits per month are free.
Raiffeisen shrinks and expands
However, there are still banks that operate deposit machines for coins, such as Credit Suisse, Zürcher Kantonalbank (ZKB) and Raiffeisen. The cooperative bank currently has 485 ATMs where you can also deposit coins. And there will be more soon. The reason: Two-thirds of all branches of Raiffeisen banks have switched to the advisory bank model without a traditional counter. ATMs are becoming more and more important.
However, the service is not free: for cashing coins into the depositor, Raiffeisen Switzerland recommends that Raiffeisen banks charge a fee of three percent of the total amount of coins paid, or at least three francs. A fee of five per cent of the total amount of coins, or at least five francs, for depositing coins in cash in the safe.
The nerves are getting worse at Migros Bank too
There are no machines in Migros Bank where you can deposit money. But you can do this in the switch. However, at Migros Bank, customers first have to roll their coins on paper, laboriously on the kitchen table at home.