Fake One Pound Coins – Part One
I’m not sure whether I’m just particularly unlucky when it comes to being passed counterfeit pound coins, or whether I just happen to notice them more often. Either way, the amount of dodgy one pound coins in circulation must be enormous (1% I’m told).
Anyway, how do you spot them? Well here’s a few good examples of bent coins. It’s easier than you might think, as fortunately counterfeiters aren’t the sharpest tools…
Example #1:
(click on image for larger version)
As far as crooked £1’s go, this is pretty good and will easily pass as real from a ‘quick glance’. The front and back have been stamped centrally and clearly and the colour is good.
It’s much harder to achieve a readable edge inscription “DECUS ET TUTAMEN” though and it’s this that gives this coin away as being fake when inspected more closely. The inscription is half missing, not centred correctly and the coin is only 80% milled.
The year on the front of this coin is 1996. The reverse for this year should be a Celtic cross. Oops! Those not so clever fakers have stamped a Rampant Lion from 1994’s pound coin on the back.
Example #2:
In contrast to the previous example, it’s the colour on this coin that tips you off to it being a fake. I’d imagine that when this coin was freshly counterfeited, it was a pretty good copy. A few years in circulation and the signs of wear give it away now though. But, the fakers aren’t really going to give a toss if it doesn’t stand the test of time, are they.
As you can see from the picture, the silver of the metal below is blatantly showing. You can see on the reverse where I’ve scratched off the ‘gold top coat’ with my fingernail! When compared against a real pound coin, this fake is also very slightly too large and misshapen. Doh! You’d have trouble passing this bad boy through a vending machine then.
Example #3:
The texture of the front of this coin just looks wrong. It has a ’sprayed’ look, which probably doesn’t come across that well in the picture. Both front and back are centrally stamped, but the edge inscription is of very poor quality and is only partially milled. The reverse Celtic cross isn’t as clear as it should be and is obviously lacking in any detail. When compared to a genuine £1 coin, it’s again very slightly too big.
Having said that, it’s another fairly good copy and could easily be passed off.
Quite remarkedly, the year, edge inscription and reverse picture again all tie up. It’s unbelievably common for them to not match, as you’ll see…
Example #4:
The face on this fake isn’t quite centrally stamped. The edge is 90% milled. The quality of the lettering on the face stamp isn’t marvellous.
As you can see, the face is stamped 1992 and “DECUS ET TUTAMEN” is stamped around the edge. The reverse shows a thistle sprig in a coronet. Doh!! Those pesky fakers have got it wrong again. 1992 was an oak tree in a coronet!
Anyway, that’s enough dodgy pounds for now… more another time!
Part two and part three.
[...] Anyway, following on from the other post about crooked quids, I’ll go through a few more examples of counterfeit £1 coins: [...]
[...] I guess when it comes to counterfeit £1 coins, I’m a bit of a geek. I’ve blogged a couple of times before about fake coins, but it’s been a while, so I thought I’d post another small bunch. [...]
As a shopkeeper I have become quite good at spotting fakes, though they have improved recently. My problem is that I work on small margins, I cannot afford to alienate innocent customers by refusing to accept fake coins, and I certainly cannot afford to bag up the £30-40 worth a day I get and just hand them over to the authorities with no hope of compensation. So I do what all my fellow small shop strugglers do, keep mum and recirculate them. Untill the well salaried, guaranteed pensioned lawmakers change the rules the problem will not get solved.
Woah, that’s a lot of fakes! I’ll have to admit, I’d probably do the same if I were in the same situation as you.
I’m not sure if compensating people for handing them in is really the answer though, as it’d only make it easier for counterfeiters to collect full face value – rather than them having to go to backstreet pubs and asking random punters if they want to buy a bag of twenty £1 pound coins for a tenner etc.
It’d be better to make the coins harder (and more expensive) to fake in the first place – but I’m sure that won’t happen anytime soon with the one pound coin.
I have an Elizabeth II 2002 pound coin, this is normal. the only thing is that there is a stamp of the letter ‘R’ on her face…
Does anyone know what this means?
I’ve been monitoring fakes in my change for many years now, sometimes rejecting them and sometimes adding them to my collection. I’ve “estimated” that the proportion in circulation is probably slightly higher than the latest official estimate of 1-2%
However last week I got called in to count 70-odd pounds-worth of circulation pound coins, and 12% were fairly-obviously fake to someone familiar with them. They were different flavours of fake, ie not all from the same forgery! In a London suburb…
Would your shopkeeper “Hic Vadum” care to mention what kind of fraction of those he sees are fakes?
I’ve got a fake pound coin. Its not a bad fake, the only thing it is, you put the queens head facing upwards, turn it around and the other side is upside down!
i’ll send a pic if you want, dave
I collect many one pound coins as Treasurer for our WI and must warn the members about the difference. Also I will not be able to bank this cash either
Just another way to put more fear and lack of trust amonug us. Just the other day I saw a guy at the cash machine who was paroniod that an old lady was trying to see his been. I say bring back trust.
see his pin
A dubious few coins I’ve seen the writng on the side seems the wrong way up. If the writing is not in same direction as queens head is it a fake. Most coins have it facing the queens head but some I’ve seen don’t.
SM, unfortunately no, it doesn’t mean it’s a fake.
The way I understand the creation process, a blank coin (a ‘planchet’) is held by a surrounding grooved collar. The front and back is then struck simultaneously to create the head and tail of the coin. The force of the strike, expands the coin into the collar grooves, creating the milled edge.
The coin is then released and falls out of the collar so it can be fed through a separate machine to have the edge inscription added.
In theory, it’d be a 50/50 chance which way up the inscription appears as it depends on whichever side the coin lands after the first stage.
There’s a bit more info here.
I checked all my pound coins change (4) on Tuesday after article in paper and found one with the image of the queen as on a 20p piece with the base of the kneck curved down instead of up, a piece cut of the left hand side of the kneck and Elizabeth II on the right hand side of the front of the coin!
I did a coffee morning on Saturday and received 5 £1 coins (out of 63) with no writing at all around edge, are these fake?
If they’re dated between 2004-7, then they should have two overlapping lines running around the edge instead of a text inscription. One of the lines is angular, the other is curved. There should be a break in the pattern with a ‘dot’ in it.
If they’re from another year, then yes, probably fake.
Can anybody verify the following-am I right in saying that the 1983 pound coin can only have the old picture of the Queen on it, and not the new picture and dated 2003…is this a fake…?
Hi Clive, that’s right, a 1983 dated coin wouldn’t have the Ian Rank-Broadley picture of the Queen on it, as that wasn’t even designed until 1997. So that would be a fake.
A coin dated 2003 however, would have the new Queen head design on it. And, it would share the same reverse and edge inscription of the 1983 coin.
Hope that makes sense! This might help too.
moan moan moan….. you have all once passed one or more on to the next person, knowingly or otherwise
So I don’t get it, are you saying that the one’s with 1994 stamps are FAKE? What is the edge to read? So give example of a REAL one…
CB, no, not at all. A genuine 1994 pound coin will have a Lion Rampant on the back and the edge inscription will read “Nemo Me Impune Lacessit”. If it’s any other combination, then it MUST be fake.
However, sometimes even counterfeiters will manage to get the year/edge/reverse combination correct, so there are other signs to check for too, as covered in detail in the other parts of this post and in the comments to them.
You can find all the correct year/edge/reverse combinations on the Royal Mint page. Chances are you’ll never remember them though (which is why counterfeiters don’t really care much about getting it right), so spotting fakes from the other signs is often much easier when you don’t have easy access to the above guide.
Has anyone had any fake £2 coins. I think I have been given one but In feel it’s a good fake. It is the colouring of the coin and the writing around the edge is poor and dropping off the edge of the coin. Does anyone know about fake £2 coins to help me.
Hi H, I’ve not spotted any fake £2 coins myself, but a few people have mentioned seeing them. If you could scan it, or take a decent picture of it, I’d be quite interested. :-)
I knock the middle out of a £2 coins and put them back the wrong side in when I am bored, sorry.
Yesterday I received in my change a Manx one pound coin, no engraving around the edge. Very blurred poor engraving the three legs Manx sign on the ‘tail’. Fake? What say you?
I have tried to ignore this but with all the comments on how good this information is I feel I need to reply.
The information in a number of the examples is misleading and incorrect.
Example 1 Rampant Lion should have an inscription ‘’DECUS ET TUTAMEN”
This is incorrect the Rampant Lion should have NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSIT it very easy to spot if you use the image side to check coins against.
Example 2 these type have more chance of going through the coin mech.
Example 4. The Thistle should have NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSIT not DECUS ET TUTAMEN
Example 5.1995 should be PLEDIOL WYF I’M GWLAD not NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSIT as suggested.
The best way to tell a fake particully if you have a lot of £1 coins is to sort them by the image i.e Royal Arms, Celtic Cross ect.. then sort them sort each group by date (see Royal mint web site for correct info). This will find most of the fakes. Then once they have been sort into the corrcet image and date check the sides. Line up the mint marks and compare just that group. This will show up any poor or incorrect inscription. Finally if you want to check a bit more check that the image and heads are aline.
Hi Andy,
Thanks for stopping by and for your comments.
Regarding the points you raised:
Example 1 – I think you may have misunderstood what I have written there. I’m just using the year to check – not the image side. Example 1 is supposedly a 1996 coin. The fake I’m talking about therefore has the correct “DECUS ET TUTAMEN” inscription for 1996 on it. This example fake however has an incorrect Rampant Lion stamped on the reverse for the claimed year (1996). I don’t actually say what you state I have incorrectly said.
Example 2 – I’m not mechanically minded, so I’d be quite interested to hear why you think an oversized, misshapen fake coin would have more chance of going through a coin mechanism successfully than a correctly sized fake coin? It’d kinda defeat the object of any coin size sorting if that was the case wouldn’t it? I realise that ‘magnetic signatures’ and weight would also probably play a part in modern coin mechanisms, but that’s another matter. I see from the site you’ve linked as your homepage it looks like you may have be able to give some useful insight here?
Example 4 – You seem to have misunderstood this in a similar way you did Example 1. I’m talking about a supposed 1992 coin, which should indeed have a DECUS ET TUTAMEN inscription. I don’t say that a Thistle reverse should have DECUS ET TUTAMEN inscription.
Example 5 – You are quite correct there however and I have amended that accordingly. Thanks for pointing my mistake out on that one.
I hope that clears everything up. :-)
C
I found 5 fakes out of 130 coins, 3 are average fakes but would pass as genuine to most till jockeys, the fourth is perfect front and back but with a poor inscription. The fifth I had to really argue with myself if it was a fake because it is excellent, it’s a correct copy of the dragon pound, the milling is good and the inscription is roughly the correct font, however the inscription is nowhere near deep/clear enough and the cross on it is wrong it’s just a cross like a plus sign the coin is in good lightly circulated condition so the faintness is def not due to wear
I have checked a large number of pound coins recently and I have found that the 2000 ‘dragon’ reverse often has a light strike of the edge legend. Provided that the lettering is in the correct style and typeface (compare with another) and there are no other obvious defects, it is likely that your coin is genuine.
Bill’s right,
Don’t look to deep, I think everyone forgets that thousands of coins are minted per minute, using a number of different machines. If you have any doubts then assume that its genuine.
Just for C’s information, last week I again checked out a vending machine cash box and out of the 109 £1 coins I found 3 that are dedicate fakes. There was also another 3 that I had my doubts about.
Some time ago it was reported that an African country (Swaziland Lesotho?) had a coin the same size and weight as a UK £1 coin. Was there ever a problem with these being passed in coin operated coins?
Also, can anyone tell me why places like Gibraltar and the Falklands have their own coinage when the currency has parity with UK sterling? Jersey and Guernsey I can understand but not British Dependent Terrortries having their own.
Thanks.
Andy
Yes the Swaziland coin was a problem, I believe the blank was made by the Royal Mint. Many years ago they changed the make up of the coins metal content and new measuring technoligies in the coin mech have helped to reduce the problem.
We are just starting to put out some coin info on our web site so if your interested have a look http://www.willings.co.uk.
Hi,
I have a very odd pound coin,
I’v never seen this one before.
It has what looks like a knite on horse back.
Above it says `AMICUS . CHRISTI . GEORGIUS`
At the bottem it has “£1″ Witch made me think it might be fake.
I tried the axies test ( Holding the coin and looking at the placements of the head and pattern on the back)
and it matches.
It has no Lettering on the side. Not even a cross. Just virtical lines.
On the otherside It has Queen elizbeth II’s head.
Above it says.
Giberaltar . elizabeth II
With 2003 under the head.
I’d like To know if its fake, or if anyone has one of these coins.
Thanks.
Adam.
It doesn’t sound like a fake, but it does sound like you’ve found yourself a 2003 Gibraltar pound coin. (Image from the World Coin Gallery)
I think strictly speaking it isn’t legal tender in the UK, but just take it to a bank and they’ll probably swap it for you free of charge. As it’s pounds sterling it’s worth exactly the same as a UK pound. Saying that, most shops/people wouldn’t even notice/mind/care if you tried to spend it here though.
thanks for your infomation, you might be interested to know, i spent it in a shop 4 hours ago.
Adam
Just to confirm the myth that vending machines don’t accept fakes. Yesterday, using a coin validator set up to reject fakes, I inspected 280 £1 coins taken from fruit machines of a local working mans club.
Our coin validator rejected 13 coins, out of these their 9 are definite fakes, the others will need much closer inspection.
So in the best case that’s 3.2%, not bad as vending machines don’t accept fakes.
Interesting stat, thanks for that!
These might be a daft questions (so apologies in advance), but how come the fruit machines accepted those 13 coins in the first place if your validator can pick them up? Do those particular fruit machines just happen to use older/different/less effective coin validation methods?
Plus, in your experience do fruit machines generally have more of a problem with counterfeit coins than other vending machines do?
By the way, I’ve just been reading some of the info on your website (quick plug: Willings). Most informative, but I couldn’t seem to read the £1 fake ‘fact file 00002′, as it just kept loading 00001 again. Part 1 left me wanting more! :-)
Not a daft questions. I started to answer your questions but it got a bit lengthy, so I have decided to add it to my fact file for next week 00003.
00002 will partly answer the questions?
Glad to see that the fact files are of interest. I was getting ahead of myself and uploaded the link before I had completed No.2. I hope to upload it later today.
Just to say that I have now uploaded a reply to our web site and sorted out the links.
Hi Andy, as always, thanks for the reply. I think what I was really wondering is that do you think that counterfeiters use fruit machines as a low risk (albeit inefficient) way of trying to exchange large quantities of fake pound coins for real ones?
In the past this has been the case and not just fruit machines. Now it seems that we just have a large volume of fakes in general circulation that are being used vending machines.
The recent articles that schools have warned hundreds of parents to beware, after received more than 100 fake £1 coins as payment for meals, suggests to me that the fakes are being made for use in everyday life.
However, there will always be a bit of trying to exchange fakes for real coins ( or goods )through vending machines.
I work in an amusement arcade in dorset and over the last three years i have experienced the following:-
1) african coins were a big problem for the arcade last spring to summer. We have alsorts of levels of tech re coin mechs from stone ones to ones that havent been invented yet ;) and generally the VERY old coin mechs took these coins, there is a cigerete machine that would take them 100%
2) fakes…because of the business i am in, i find that £1 coins are generally treated as tokens which are cashed up for paper money at the customers discretion. it is for this reason that we practise the rule where if a coin is accepted through the coin mech, it is accepted. all rejects are seperated and put into two catagories useable and chuckable.
3) we put our pound coins in pots of 50 and i would almost say with certancy* that there is at least 1 fake per 50. it is really amazing that with all the publicity there has been of late on the subject, that not many people actually can be bothered to look or inform themselves of the situation.
now on a slightly different note (or coin…boom boom)
i have come across a bailiwick pound coin a few times that has no queens head (1983 if i remember correctly) boat on one side and a crest on the other? any clues on how many were made ect?
be well
D
I think you are talknig about a 1983 Guernesy £1, I believe there was only about 269,000 minted, the boat is HMS Crescent.
Can you tell me about £1 coins which don’t have lettering around the edges – i.e a sort of ribbon effect? Are these fake or simply a change from the Decus et Tutamen? Many thanks.
2004-2007 pound coins have two overlapping lines, one curved, one angular – supposedly to symbolise “bridges and pathways”. There should be a small dot separating the beginning and end of the pattern. So, not necessarily fake, no.
Interesting to see the discussion turning to Channel Island coins as they are often, along with Isle of Man and Gibraltar pounds, mistaken for counterfeits. However, not all are genuine! I have recently got a forged 1994 Jersey pound with the ship ‘Resolute’ on the reverse. I was really surprised that anybody would have bothered to forge one of these.
I’ve been collecting ‘fake coins’ since the start of the year and now can usually spot one immediately in a handful of change. I’ve got around 25 so far as well as £1 coins from Jersey, Isle of Man, Guernsey and Gibraltar.
My collection started when I decided to collect all the differing £1 designs since 1983 as a set for my kids but started noticing the fakes and decided to read up on the subject. This was the first website I found where I could relate to specific fakes I had got.
Many fakes are poor quality but I have found some that are really good copies and only after a fair bit of scrutiny do you realise its a fake.
There really aren’t enough people around who know how to spot them and this is what the forgers rely on. Even talking to my workmates shows how few people know about the scale of the problem.
Detecting a forged £1 coin is really easy.
I manufacture a small piece of test equipment.Just place the sensor
on the coin and it indicates if it is valid.
The actual patent goes back some 30 years its just found a new application.
Hi Len I would like to know more, can you please e-mail your contact details to info@willings.co.uk
i got told that the pound coins with the diamond shapes going around the side are fake is this true?
Hi, if you mean the ‘bridges and pathways’ pattern (ie, like the criss-cross pattern on the middle coin in this picture), then no. That pattern appears on coins minted between 2004-2007. But that’s not to say that there aren’t going to be fakes of those coins though – quite a few people have mentioned here that they’ve seen fakes of the ‘bridge series’ of pound coins.
I had a fast food restaurant try to pass me a ghastly fake yesterday. The colour was the real giveaway – it was more like a brass 3d bit than that you would expect for a £1 coin. The edge was particularly ghastly – poor milling, barely-there and smudged lettering. I didn’t check it any more thoroughly and rejected it. They got me a real one.
(For those unfamiliar, 3d in old money was equivalent to 1.25p in new – banks will still take four 3d bits as 5p. However, the coin is 12-sided, not round.)
Another two, at the same time, from the same outlet. One had a dragon back but DECUS ET TUTAMEN in a poor font on the edge. Other had a leeks back, good (and correct!) edge but very poor stamping on the faces. Both were replaced before I left the counter. Colour wasn’t bad this time.
I haven’t spotted many fakes, but I did get a dodgy 1994 pound in my change from the self service till in Marks and Sparks this morning.
The reverse is the lion in border which is correct, but it’s a bit off centre and doesn’t line up with the heads side. It’s pretty much the right colour, but it has a very bad quality edge inscription (and the wrong one for the year).
Overall I’d say it’s a medium quality fake. I’ve seen much better ones where only the edge inscription really gave it away.