Hacking a CoinStar machine to bypass transaction fees
By Darren Murph 
posted Aug 7th 2007 4:41AM
posted Aug 7th 2007 4:41AM
We've seen a number of somewhat innocent (and equally wily) hacks that save the little man a dime or two, but never quite so literally as this one. CoinStar machines -- best known for charging a whopping nine percent or so for the convenience of counting our coins for us -- have apparently been outsmarted, making the green machine convert your coins to dollars gratis (without going through the process of getting a gift card). Hit the read link to find out more.[Thanks, Joe]
Update: Upon reflection, we probably shouldn't go into the gory details of how its done -- but it's nothing so mind-blowing (except for its potential illegality -- you wouldn't tamper with an ATM, would you? This ain't much different.). Or you can, you know, do the right thing and just take an Amazon gift cert and not have to live a look-over-your-shoulder kind of lifestyle.
I'm in the UK, and there's a coinstar at my local ASDA store, does anybody know if this works the same way with the iTunes vouchers being available as I've never actually used the machine myself but I've got 30 quid in change upstairs I would like to change (commision-free of course)
You could just count it and take it to the bank...
Yer... but they get really stressy when I take it all down to the bank!
It's the bank's job to take your change. Make 'em work for their job.
That's certainly better than cheating/stealing from Coinstar.
Is it also the banks job to fill out your deposit slips and make sure you have sufficient funds in your account to cover your transactions and make sure your aren't cashing scam checks from Cameroon?
CoinStar firmware update push in 3... 2... 1...
You could always just buy your own coin sorting machine, then take the sorted and counted change to the bank.
WTF, Engadget ?
This was actually on digg a few months ago, Kevin talked all a bout it.
"gizmo will spin its wheels for a bit whilst trying to reconnect,"
Whilst trying? Whilst? Sounds like pretty cumbersome British or Aussie English. Try the more efficient word, while.
When you say cumbesome british english, you do realise that the language is called english because it's from england, right? just because you butchered the language doesn't mean your way of talking is right.
tut tut
Whilst has just one more letter than while, and has a slightly different meaning. I hardly thing one letter's difference in the service of a more precise statement makes it "inefficient". Lay off the British!
True, he could have used "while", but that would be grammatically incorrect. If by efficient you meant "saving the 1/4th of a second he would have saved by typing a 5-letter word instead of a 6-letter word, I suppose you're right. But if you're going to insist on using incorrect grammar to be more efficient, then im surprizd ur not typng lyk dis.
Brilliant? Debatable. Criminal? Probably.
WTF Engadget? There are clever hacks to legitimately save some coin, but this is just shitty. If you don't like the Coinstar fees, don't use the kiosks - they have to pay a pretty penny to the stores to rent the space. I doubt they're raking in millions in profit with that 9% fee after paying for the space, the kiosk hardware, the labor for servicing them, and even the shipping costs of all those coins. (I worked on a kiosk project once where it rounded change up to the nearest dime - it was cheaper to do that than ship and stock pennies and nickels.)
If someone doesn't like the fees - take your coins to your bank and deposit them, or have them convert them to cash. They'll generally do it without a fee for account holders.
Or just spend your change as you get it and you won't have any built up to deal with in the first place. (Which is what I do, I pretty much never have more than $1 in change to my name - I optimize my payments each time. Simple math.)
I'm looking forward to the first arrests that come from this "hack."
I'm with you on the spending change. As far as simple math goes, the cashiers have a hard enough time figuring out why I give them $20 and three pennies when my total comes to $17.78, what are the chances the average consumer will be able to do that kind of complicated math so quickly?
Next week on Engadget... "How to hack a bank using only a ski mask and a shotgun."
I use Coinstar often. Though the fees are steep at 9%, I don't mind.
Just ask yourself: Is 9% of whatever you're counting going to kill your wallet?
did you say you doubt they raking in millions? Have a look at their profile. Their revenue per quarter is over $130 million. Yes that's Million.
I do believe that it is unethical to hack the machine. They are providing a service and charging for it same as any other company. 9% is actually a very small amount to pay. I wonder how much Amazon marks up its products I am sure its more than 9%.
-SKP
"did you say you doubt they raking in millions? Have a look at their profile. Their revenue per quarter is over $130 million. Yes that's Million."
Who cares what their revenue is? Their net profit margin was 3.48% in 2006. That's less than simply putting money in the bank. They are by no means ripping anyone off.
I'm sorry, but in New Zealand we have places called Banks that change money for free. Do you have to pay to have your coins/notes changed in America???
It's a machine you get in supermarkets that changes money
....they still have banks
Heh, In Southland, We have this crazy thing called EFTPOS, so most of us don't carry around cash or change any more...
Banks insist you bring your change counted and rolled, and when you have as much spare change as most Americans, that takes quite a bit of time.
@Biffmeister
I have NEVER had a problem getting my large plastic container of change counted at my bank, and I've been a member with many different banks! Bank One (now JP Morgan/Chase), Wells Fargo, US Bank, Washington Mutual, etc.
This is their JOB! They have a change counting machine specifically for this purpose.
My bank hates it when you bring in rolled coins. They have their own counting machine and much prefer that you bring in loose change. Although if you aren't an account holder and want your change counted immediately then they will charge you 5% up to $5.
Back in the summer of 2001, after I spent a full afternoon rolling a years worth of jarred coinage, Washington Mutual was nice enough to try to charge me a per roll fee when I went to deposit them into my account.
The fee would have been more than nine percent of the cash value since it was per roll, and not based on the amount of money deposited.
I was told that they did not charge the fee if you deposited (I believe) less than 5 rolls.
I dumbed about 40 rolls into a CoinStar machine instead.
A month week later I went to the bank and closed my account.
It turns out my account was not actually closed, only all the money was withdrawn, leaving me a zero balance.
A month and a half later I received a statement with an overdraft on it. The only transaction was for the monthly fee they levee on your "free checking account" when your monthly balance is below $2000.
I had to pay the overdraft to close the account or next month I would have had the fee again.
WaMu Sux!
What were we talking about?
Just cashed in £138 in loose change at my local Sainsbury's (got £128 back in nice crisp notes (and a couple of pound coins) once I'd redeemd the voucher). As this particular machine is in full view of everyone, I think I would have looked quite suspcicious rooting around the back of it (assuming the UK ones are hooked into the 'net also). Not that I'd have tried anyway!
Do Engadget promote theft and fraud now? Is CoinStar some evil empire we should rally against or are they just a company (with mortgage-paying employees) who charge you a fee for doing a job? A fee that you can take or leave? They have no monopoly on counting coins, your hands will do a fine job.
So, here's my hack based on Engadget's standards: When at the Candy store, wait until the owner's back is turned and they you'll find you can take all the candy you want without paying a cent! All you have to do is make sure they don't see you doing it.
This kind of hack is music to the RIAA's ears. Turns out we are all criminals after all.
Dude. Shut up.
I know some people just aren't feeling the hacker spirit, and that's OK I guess, but please keep in mind that "knowing" is different than "doing". I'm sure we all know about lots of bad stuff that we don't actually go and do. Yes, even you.
I'm happy paying the fee, the whole point of coinstar is that you're too lazy to count the coins yourself, and they have a machine to do that for me, which as other people have said costs money for them to maintain. This isn't a hack, it's fraud.
i see a firmware upgrade soon!
Yes, brilliant indeed!
On another note I have come up with another 'especially satisfying little hack' that 'saves the little man a dime or two', it involves redirecting all the ad traffic revenue from engadget into a communal paypal account for redistribution to all readers.
It's win-win for the little man, wouldn't you say? I mean, it's not like engadget is performing a service for which they should be paid, am I right?
u-u-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h-h (to the sound Lurch makes). Party to the crime; same penalty as the actual perp; at least in Wisconsin.
dude.. that's from '05.... but thanks anyway, i'll do this next time no one watching.... lol NOT.... why not just go to the bank?
this isn't any more criminal than flipping the switch on a pinball machine to get some free games
What's the point? Coinstars already give you gift cards worth 100% of your coins. Just pick one for a store you use a lot, and it's the just as good as cash.
I hate to say it but I'm going to bash this article. If any of you readers out there have ever read 2600 you would of seen this in one of their 2005 issues. I don't remember which one exactly but thats where I first heard about this.
This is theft. I definitely enjoy reading about this sort of thing, but I would not actually use it or encourage anyone else to.
Coming tomorrow,
"Hacking Engadget to Disable Display of all Ads."
We can do that right now:
Use Firefox and install the Adblock add-on. On this page alone I can see 109 blockable items in my Adblock (though many of them are legit).
Damn straight!
Looking at ads is for suckers.
...or on a Windows machine you can just edit your HOST file to redirect all known ad sites to localhost (127.0.0.1).
You can even download an altered HOST file here to block all of Engadget's ads:
http://www.mvps.org/winhelp2002/hosts.htm
Not that it's wrong or anything to circumvent revenue streams, right Engadget?!
the best way to optimize the coinstar machines is to only let it count your pennies. Remove most of your silver coins especially your quarters. It costs over 2 cents in fees to count one quarter.
Or just go to the bank. Most local banks have FREE yes FREE coin counting machines. This blog is pointless. Unless its on hack-a-day.c_m.
let me get this straight .. because i'm from a backwater country so to speak ... in the west if you have a bag of change .. stores arent happy to take it off your hands and give you bills instead ?
Most stores are too busy to count a ton of change for you, and can rightly tell you that they don't take large amounts of change (though that limit is of course flexible). If somebody bought 10 bucks worth of stuff at a busy convenience store in pennies, would you want to be behind them in line, waiting for the clerk to count to 1000?
Anyway, I think the proper protocol is to tell CoinStar before you tell the world, but if the hack has been "public knowledge" since 2005, I think it's pretty much their fault this is allowed to continue.
Keep in mind: the other day I saw an ad for these things, and apparently you also pay no commission on gift cards to a lot of other stores, like Circuit City. I don't amass a lot of change -- I tend to spend it as I get it -- but if I did, I probably shop at Circuit City enough that I could just use a CoinStar machine to pay for something I was going to buy anyway...
Coin Counting Homepage-
http://www.theunderstory.com/index.htm
"When you say cumbesome british english, you do realise that the language is called english because it's from england, right? just because you butchered the language doesn't mean your way of talking is right.
tut tut"
Actually, what we did was eliminate much of the superfluous British spelling and pronunciation. But unfortunately it remains in the "old" country. Now if we could just get the Brits to streamline some of their spelling and terminology, we could bring them into the linguistic 21st century. How is maneuver spelled in British English? Manoeuver or something like that? Really clumsy. The Brits love those oe's.
OK, so how do you explain monstrosities of US English such as "burglarized"? (The British English is "burgled").
I'm not trying to get into a fight with you, just pointing out that there are differences, that even out, on the whole, to be neutral. Language is constantly changing and evolving - nobody changes anything by proscribing the illogical (cf. esperanto, "simplified spelling"). Language is not good or bad, it just *is*.
Where I come from, we have a word for this type of "hack": theft.
Also where I come from, the banks have coin cointing machines in their lobbies, with no charge applied for counting if you're a bank customer. Thus, no need to pay 8.9% to Coinstar.
Did you hear that ? That was the sound of Engadget's editorial standards going down the drain...
Goodbye deontology, hello legal liability ! *polite golf clap*
In the Washington DC area Chevy Chase Bank has a free coin counting machine for both account holders and non-account holders.
Actually - all this talk of going to the bank to change out your coin to cash isn't all it's cracked up to be_
In the US - the largest bank in the states - Bank of America will not count out your money the several times I've tried to have them do it - they mention the coin machines or offer me paper rolls so I can do it myself_
They don't seem to burden themselves with trivial things such as coins_
None of the Big Banks in my area (central US) takes unrolled coins. However, all the local and regional banks here (better banks in so many ways) gladly take unrolled coins.
Great, this article now justifies blocking all ads when visiting Engadget. You know, the greedy Engadget that bothers readers with a whopping truckload of ads on every page. A great shtick that saves the little man like me a dime or two while still being able to use their bandwith. Brilliant, I say.
What's the point? There are NO FEES if you choose to get an Amazon.com of Circuit City gift certificate instead of cash.
Yeah... that whole 9% is such a bitch!
That's a whole $0.09 out of every $1.00 so that I can just dump my coins into the machine and not worry about sorting them.
Rolling them takes time, as does going to the bank, so my paying $9 out of every $100 in change (and I typically take my jar in every 18-24 months with anywhere from $200-$300 in change sitting in it) for the service is pretty sweet. This is a capitalist system - Coinstar has every right to make a profit from their service.
If you are that young and/or poor to be worrying about the 9% the machine charges then you are best off rolling your coins and taking them to the bank.
If you're just a cheapskate, then I suggest giving your damn coins to someone who can use them and not try to cheat the service.
Post news like this on www.engadget13371-14X0R.com or some other site...
Othervise I lovet this site.
Mind your revenues v. profits. Sure they take in $130M per quarter, then they spend $126M of it. Their profit margin is 3%, and they weren't profitable for the first 10 years or so of their existence, so I wouldn't say they're raking it in.
(Still, I'm anti-Coinstar as I operate a competing service - hack away!)
My local bank has a free coin counting machine.
This hack isn't even clever.
It's just cheap.
Just pay the percentage, really.
So old, so very very old.
"Whilst" is perfectly correct. I'm all for bugging the bloggers who can't spell or write properly, but for goodness sake leave them alone when they are getting it right.
Every time I have an excess amount of change, I just head to the casino and do one of two things:
1) Spend a couple hours at the slots drinking my free drinks and earing my "rewards"
OR
2) Walk around for a minute and dump my change in their change sorting machines. Its a little extra work, but it doesn't cost me a dime.
As an addendum, please plug the unit back into the wall after you're finished hacking it. Enough CoinStar machines found unplugged and I'm sure they'll modify it in the future so it's not so easy.
Me, I just get the Amazon.com voucher and be done with it.
Commerce bank has coin-counting machines, their "penny arcade", which is available for FREE even to non-account holders
God bless "America's Most Convenient Bank"
WRONG! Coinstar is already FREE as long as you take your money in the form of a giftcard or ecertificate. They only charge a fee if you take it as cash. See coinstar website. http://coinstar.com/us/webdocs/A1-0-3-1
Right... that's why this "hack" works the way it does: You have to choose the gift card, stop the gift card from activating, and then you get a receipt for the face value of the gift card since the machine can't activate the card.
Chill out.
Engadget isn't advocating breaking the law, just reporting on a process.
This isn't any different than posting the HD DVD encryption key. What you do with this knowledge is up to you but don't blame Endgadget - they aren't stealing anything at all.
Free speech! Free speech!
No, the HD-DVD case and Coinstar are completely different.
In the case of the encryption key you should be talking about people accessing material they (should) have purchased legally and are now attempting to use it under the fair use provision. No, that does not mean that people won't rent HD-DVDs from Netflix or borrow them from a friend and rip them, but that is when you are entering an area of criminal behavior and theft. But posting the key itself does not condone stealing.
In this case (the Coinstar machine) it is out and out theft. There is a massive difference.
Hollywood doesn't agree with your take on it anymore than you agree with my take on it.
Guess that makes me right, in my opinion.
Free Speech! Free Speech!
Uh, no. Copyright infringement is a civil matter. Fraud and theft are criminal matters. Ripping in dvd might cost you a couple grand if they found out and sued you. Ripping off coinstar could land you in jail.
BTW . . . if you have the coins turned in for a gift card (iTunes, Amazon, etc.) the fee is waived. True story. Done it twice now. So now you can legitimately (read: legally) get the fee waved.
Engadget just lost some of the respect I had for it today. I hope this entry is retracked.
I second taking your change to a bank. They don't like pennies though... I mean, they can't even do anything with them. It costs more than a penny to move a penny from one bank to another. So, they sit until they are a full truck of them and they cart them off to the main bank. That's why I never accept pennies anymore. I toss them into that little thingy that most stores have on the counter. I figure, let that guy keep 'em and deal with them. But all the other change I take to the bank, rolled up and counted (it's easy to do once you get a digital scale and just weigh out the coins. LOTS faster than counting.) with my name and account number on them. They usually take them no problem. But it's been years since I've done that--I use my CC everywhere. Much more efficient.
Back to the coinstar. I once saw a guy put over 900 bucks worth of change into one of those things. He had 4 ladies purses absolutely filled to the brim with every kind of coin imaginable. It took him just over an hour to feed all that change into it. The machine actually stopped taking in his change--it was full. The remaining coins he kept in the purse, and then waited for the ticket to be printed out. The customer service person did a triple take. I would have too.
Now, with that said, that guy fed over 900 bucks into that machine. At least that's what i saw. So, by my math, he might have had over $1k of money before coinstar took out it's cut.
Robbery? Hardly. Could you imagine how long it would take to count that all out and roll it for a bank? Now imaging your behind that guy in the bank. Bet your glad he went to coinstar now, eh?
Not justifying advertising this hack, but this has been well-known for over a year...
Hey, I bet this also works if you choose the option to donate the funds to a charity.
Double win, Engadget!
This really is the height of cheapness. They offer ways of getting full cash value - by getting a gift card or donating it to charity.
Hell, 9% is less than a stingy tip you'd give to a mediocre waitress.
People, here's the problem with taking it to the bank.
I walk into the nearest Chase, one of those mini-branches that's inside a grocery store. I ask them to cash my change. "Oh, we don't do that here. You'll have to take it to the branch." Which happens to be at an inconvenient distance from me. And there's a Coinstar machine right there inside the grocery store.
This makes me wonder, why doesn't this bank mini-branch cash my change? Is it because of the Coinstar machine? Or is it simply because the mini-branch (or whatever the hell it's really called) isn't equipped to take change from people and give back cash? I mean, people walk in there and hand over checks and get cash, so the cash is there, obviously.
It smells fishy. Why should Coinstar be the only option inside a building where THERE'S A BANK??
I wonder if Coin Star has any type of sorting device at their HQ to detect rare coins. I am sure there are plenty of people around that have no idea if they have a rare coin and go pop it in that machine.
I am fortunate enough to live in Las Vegas so I just take my coins to the cage in the casinos and have them count it for me. They don't charge anything for doing that.
But the biggest challenge is just getting out of the casino with the money then. Those flashing lights are so attractive.
Free online game pays you to play!
www.YourCashQuest.com
The credit union I belong to will accept and count all the loose coins I can take them. There is also at least one commercial bank in my area (DC Metro) that will take coins and count them for free.
In romania i don't really have to worry about too much change since i never really have any :)) We have bills from about 30 cents upwards so on any usual day i never see myself carrying more than 3-4 coins. And when i get really small coins, something less than the equivalent of 5 cents, i just leave it on the counter :P
Getting an iTunes at a coinstar machine is fee-free anyways. go to their web site and check it out.
"Getting an iTunes at a coinstar machine is fee-free anyways. go to their web site and check it out."
If I'm not mistaken you can also get fee-free Amazon.com gift cards and other fee-free things.
And if you select the option to contribute the money to charity, I believe the charity gets the entire amount and no percentage is taken out by Coinstar.
I've worked at several big name banks on the West coast. Not a single one carries a coin machine any more. When I started my job, I was specifically instructed NOT to take any loose change over a few dollars. Everything else has to be submitted in already counted rolls.
"When I started my job, I was specifically instructed NOT to take any loose change over a few dollars."
Makes sense, even with a machine, change counting takes time and isn't profitable for the bank. They'd much rather have their employees slapping you with fees and penalties.
I went to a Coinstar machine intending to actually get an iTunes gift card. It failed, and instead gave me a receipt for the cash minus a fee.
I had to contact the Coinstar company and have them mail me a check for the fee.
I see this as somewhat unethical, but by no means fraud.
Coinstar offers you the choice of a cash payment at a 9% fee or a gift card to various online outlets for free. If the user selects the free gift card and the machine cannot access the internet to grant the giftcard, it can't really charge you a 9% fee without your authorization. Thus, it has to issue a refund, and since it can't exactly give you your 35,403 pennies back it isssues a receipt for you to take to the cashier.
On the other hand, I would assume Coinstar normally gets paid by whatever retailer provides the gift card. After all, many gift cards are never used, so it's well worth the retailer to pay the 9%.
If you subvert the process this way, then Coinstar is getting bupkis.
Risk going to jail for an iTunes gift card and save 9% of your change?
Besides you only pay the fee if you want cold hard cash. If you turn your coins into, say, an amazon card, there is no fee. So you can be a cheapskate and STILL use the machines...
Hmmm that was supposed to be a reply to someone wayyyyy up there. What the... Don't mind me :P
Better idea: Use coinstar, pay the 9%, then just take the equivalent value in produce from the supermegamart and put it in your jacket. Walk out of the store. Much less likely to get caught than if your fiddling around behind the machine pulling out cables.
This story was on Diggnation episode 84. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_nKoFhol-Og
Last I paid attention, copyright infringement is a criminal offense. And to be certain, I'll check again now.
Ah, yes, it is a criminal offense!
FBI: "WARNING: Federal law provides severe civil and criminal penalties for the unauthorized reproduction, distribution or exhibition of copyrighted motion picures and video tapes (Title 17, United States Code, Sections 501 and 506). The Federal Bureau of Investigation investigates allegations of criminal infringement (Title 17, United States Code, Section 506)
And I know copyright infringement does hold a much more server penilty than theif as described in the article.
Or...... you guys can actually get a that iTunes gift card, or any of the other gift cards they offer: like starbucks,amazon... w/e im betting at least half the people would use one of those gift cards/certs
I'm surprised by just how many people are willing to do this. How about we all grow a conscious and become good citizens? If you really have an issue with the 9% and the cut that Coinstar gets, consider donating your coins to charity. You can do this through the Coinstar machine and they charge a reduced fee that covers operation costs only (no cut for Coinstar). When you go to deposit your coins, there is a 'donate' option. One of the choices is the March of Dimes (the charity with the mission to save babies from premature birth and birth defects), in my mind, a very worthy cause. Do something that's right. They are code 1230 on the Coinstar machine.
aaaaaaaarhghhhhhh nononono why did i only read this today. Several days ago i cashed in a few years worth of coins at a coinstar. I was supposed to get 114 dollars but only got something like 104, really dissapointing. really really really fking dissapointing. Probably the most dissapointing 10$ loss of my lilfe
Or you could go crazy and go to Commerce Bank and let their machine count it for free. No strings. No account required. I laugh whenever I see some idiot at the coin star.