Paper £20 notes

[Chicchicchicchiclana]

An older couple I know (very late 70s) have stashed about £1500 worth of £20 notes in their house. If they bank them they will go over the savings limit for the extremely tiny amount of benefits they get, so in a way I don't blame them - but that's a whole other thread.

However, they now need to get rid of them in a world that largely doesn't accept cash and they don't go anywhere to spend them. They get their shopping delivered, organised by a relative, I think they pay the relative by cheque as the relative doesn't want to accept the paper notes because in their words it would be money laundering.

They don't spend a lot, they have no needs in terms of clothes or anything else. They don't need a cleaner, yet. They both get their hair cut at home every couple of months and probably pay their hairdresser £40 cash if that.

Wwyd if you wanted to help them switch these paper notes for plastic? We don't live nearby so it's not easy.

@Zarene

Are you all seriously giving advice on how to commit benefit fraud?

Looks like it. Given how much has been triggered away by the government, personally I am not going to begrudge an elderly couple a few measly pounds per month extra on top of an evidently shitty government pension for the sake of £1,500 extra on the really low wage threshold that’s set for such benefits. Not a skirmish worth fighting.

Frittered. Not triggered.

@Sparklingbrook

Well TBF the benefit fraud has already been committed as the £1500 already exists. Like the OP said that's a whole other thread, this is querying how to swap old notes for new.

Yep a first for mumsnet. A thread which stayed on track, as asked for by the op, for nearly one page!!!

Just pay £200 into the post office
Then go to the cash point machine and take £200 out in cash - it will be new £20s
You could even do it in your account op
If you wanted to
I’ve got about 5k in old notes of £50 and £20 & £10 notes that I keep meaning to change up but it’s still legal tender so I will change it at some point

I thought money laundering was only if the money had come from the proceeds of crime?

@ChrissyPlummer

I thought money laundering was only if the money had come from the proceeds of crime?

Benefit fraud is a crime ….

I’d swap them for £1500 of plastic ones.

The relative is ridiculous. It isn't laundering to have cash from someone as payment for buying their shopping.

If you use cash op could you swap them a few hundred at a time?

They can put it into their account and start spending it. A temporary small increase in their bank balance is not going to trigger a stop on their benefits. Anyway, if the amount they get in benefits is tiny and they can't find any other way to use these banknotes, what would it matter if the benefit did stop temporarily? They'd be in no worse a position.

Just swap them at the post office

I took 10 x £20 (paper) notes into the local Santander branch and they gave me 10 × £20 (plastic) in return. I also gave them £10 note and they gave me 25 x 20p and a £5 note in return. I don't even have a personal bank account with Santander

Ooops! Of course @Bargebill19.

It’s late/ early🤣🤣

It’s not Benefit fraud to have LESS than £6k! 🤦🏼‍♀️🤣🤣

You can be on full benefits (including council tax relief and/or housing benefit and still be permitted to have up to £5,999 without it affecting your benefits! You ONLY have to declare any amount of £6,000+

So can we please stop with all the Benefit Fraud nonsense!?

This also applies to Universal Credit (and State Pension, obviously)

@Foundatarantulainmykitchen

You can be on full benefits (including council tax relief and/or housing benefit and still be permitted to have up to £5,999 without it affecting your benefits! You ONLY have to declare any amount of £6,000+

So can we please stop with all the Benefit Fraud nonsense!?

The OP said in her opening post that if this money is put into the bank it will take them over the benefit threshold so I assume they already have the maximum amount of savings in the bank and this £1500 is extra .

@Sparklingbrook NO benefit has been committed whatsoever. See above

@Floralnomad No, you’re presuming that’s what she/he meant. When you’re on benefits, any amount that goes into your bank is seen at some point, by the DWP (if they request bank statements as they often do). People often presume that any kind of money over & above their benefit award, is prohibited. It’s not the case.

It could be that they already have a lump sum of less than £6k in their bank of course, but OP didn’t say that

The OP said If they bank them they will go over the savings limit for the extremely tiny amount of benefits they get , from that it is fairly safe to assume that they have savings in the bank

Yet still an assumption. I’m sure OP will clarify….

If there isn’t any savings in the bank then they have nothing to worry about.

I had an elderly relative who used to stash a lot of money around their house as they didn’t like the bank/government/authorities to know how much money they had! 😆 Every week they would draw out around £200 cash from the bank account their pension was paid into and this eventually amounted up to about £12,000! We didn’t like knowing they had this amount in their house for security reasons so we started to put it back into their back account in smallish amounts and thankfully the bank didn’t say or ask anything- we were initially worried they would think it was dodgy money etc.

@wintertime6

Can they not take the same amount out of their bank account in plastic notes? And then bank the paper notes to bring them back up to the same balance?

This seems the most obvious solution.

Can't they just find a supermarket that accept cash and buy shopping there instead of online, there must be one or how would people with no bank accounts buy food

Self checkouts accept cash surely