Save your pennies! (and nickels...and dimes..)

[Lionesss]

While I was at the grocery store today I took a look at the coin counter and checked out the fee.

 

It states in small print 9.35%

So for every 100 dollars they get $9.35, the cost of a good mixed drink on board.

I am glad I have a battery operated coin counter and over 250 days till we sail.

Safe travels.

[lawskool10]

I too, save my change for cruises. It's mainly used to cover gambling expenses. I hate gambling, but for some reason I enjoy that silly quarter machine.

My CU does not charge members to use the coin machine.

[pbrgirl-101]

We save change also. We have the jar from AVON that counts it for you, so you see how much you have displayed on the lid. We just hit $118. We started about 3 months ago, and we thought if we could save $1 a day (.50c each per day) we would have an extra $120 for chump change (we're still 30 days out from our cruise). So we're a little ahead of the game. I think I contribute more than he does though!! LOL

 

Also, for those 5 gallon water jugs that people are using, I have two sets of friends that collect change in those, and they say that every "inch" of change equals about $100 (all coin denominations mixed). That might be an easy way to approximate your savings.....

[simplelife]

Kim - Would you rather buy groceries or go on a cruise??/

I think the idea is that you would use the card for groceries and then put the grocery money you would have spent otherwise towards your cruise.

[michelle1836]

we do the change thing too. the change goes into separate containers when dumped so it is already sorted when it is time to roll them up!

[Kinkacruiser]

Seems a lot easier to just budget for your cruise and spending money. You have to bag it yourself here and or they charge a fee. Open a separate "holiday cruise account" and deposit a regular anount each week.

If saving in a jar works for you, then keep doing it.:)

[okbookgirl]

Kim - Would you rather buy groceries or go on a cruise??/

 

 

Use the gift card to buy the groceries and then take the cash from your account that you would have used and put that into savings.

[simplelife]

The only automatic coin counter machines around here are in grocery stores - I think they're called CoinStar? There's a "service fee" assessed when you use one but I don't know what % is withheld - might be about 8%. So that eats into the savings aspect...

With Coinstar you can get the full value if you get it in the form of a gift card to selected supporting merchants. These generally include grocery, drug, and department stores, so you can use these ahead of the cruise for things you would buy anyway and sock the cash you would have used into your curise savings account.

 

My credit union location has a no-fee change counter, promoted for use for kids accounts, but any member can use it.

 

I actually find it fun to count and roll coins the old fashioned way. I'm always surprised by how much I have and it feels like found money when I'm done. I do it every few weeks. Last cruise we had enought for all our incidental expenses - extra tips for excursions ans porters and service beyond the auto-tips, taxis and drinks in port, souvinirs, etc (anything not on our sign-n-sail).

[Coolmama_1]

I do the change jar for our cruises too. I also started putting aside the odd amounts on paychecks and just depositing even $100.00's. It is amazing hour you don't miss amounts like $33.33 or $52.19 from a check and how fast that can add up!

[reeran]

Our bank has a free counter for it's customers. When we cruised to Hawaii 2 years ago hubby had saved almost $2000.00 in his 5 gallon pickle jar. We dumped it into 3 buckets and took it to the bank counter. Right after we started some poor guy with a 1# coffee can of change got in line behind us...by the time we were finished there were 7 people in line. They were all pretty nice about the wait!!! :rolleyes:

[gssmks]

We started doing this about five years ago when we were planning our first trip to Walt Disney World. I booked and paid for the trip. I told my daughter that we would do this and what ever money she was able to save, she could use for extra spending money for herself. She quickly filled her jar in just two months (I admit that family members started giving her all their change to) and when we took it to the bank it was over $100.00. By the time we went to WDW six months later, she had over $500.00.

 

Then for our first cruise, we started right when we booked the cruise and saved for over a year. We added a twist by putting in cash money from time to time when we saved it in another area. Say we had planned to go out for dinner and a movie and for some reason we didn't get to go. That money went into jar. In one year, we saved $1300.00 which covered all the on board expenses and excusions. It even gave my daughter a significant amount of money to spend in the shops.

[reeran]

For our fourth cruise I did something similar...I was purchasing 2 Venti Mocha lattes ar Starbucks each day (one before work and one during) for about $8 a day. What made me quit was reading the nutritionals, I could have eaten 2 Big Macs a day and consumed about the same ft/calories!!!!:eek: So I started taking a large coffee from home in the morning and every payday putting $80.00 in a special account ($8.00 x 10 work days) In less than a year it paid for a cruise!!! What a waste of money that was!!! I hadn't had a Mocha Latte all year and when we went to the airport to go on the cruise hubby bought me one...lol I didn't taste that good!!!LOL

[emms]

Ilive in Wales and have started saving £2 coins they are not as readily available as £1 coins and are quite cumbersome.I keep them in a Branston pickle jar and have over £200, :)its not going to pay for our cruise but its a bit of spending money

[cruiserbryce]

for the cruise we just took we had been doing the same thing and cam up with almost $200!! A nice little chunk of change and without a lot of scrimping

[G'ma]

Been doing that for years.

 

I save it all in a big coffee can. Also toss in 1$ bills once in a while. For some reason they seem to accumulate in my wallet.

 

This is my gambling stash. Will take the can to the bank a couple weeks before cruising and convert it all to cold hard cash in large bills......

 

This is the sum total of my "gambling" budget onboard.

 

Amazing how quickly it all adds up..and you don't even miss the money.

[chasinraynbowz]

We save change in our big water bottle. DH kind of humored me when we started and after a few weeks, I did a quick count and told him we had over $40. He thought we might only have $20... so it was an eye opener for him. Rule is we can't spend our change. We have to break dollar bills and all the change goes into our jug.

 

I have also quit smoking... but that money is going for something for ME! lol

[reeran]

We save change in our big water bottle. DH kind of humored me when we started and after a few weeks, I did a quick count and told him we had over $40. He thought we might only have $20... so it was an eye opener for him. Rule is we can't spend our change. We have to break dollar bills and all the change goes into our jug.

 

I have also quit smoking... but that money is going for something for ME! lol

 

 

Isn't it amazing how it adds up?

[BBigfoot613]

We save change in our big water bottle. DH kind of humored me when we started and after a few weeks, I did a quick count and told him we had over $40. He thought we might only have $20... so it was an eye opener for him. Rule is we can't spend our change. We have to break dollar bills and all the change goes into our jug.

 

I have also quit smoking... but that money is going for something for ME! lol

 

I do the same thing along with another trick to help it grow faster. I work in a factory with the standard vending machines. I don't typically buy from the snack machines (75 cents and up for tiny bags of chips/pretzles) but I always need coffee (3rd shift). I get $5 in quarters from the change machine and then every morning I deposit the remaining change into our jug. then I repeat daily. I usually deposit 2.50-3.50 into the jug. Then I wrap the coins once a month usually at the beginning of the month so I don't have a full day of wrapping. I started adding coins in Aug. and started the $5 thing in nov. and to date I have about $300 in there. Much to the suprise of my DW when I told her how much was in it. She started rambling on with what it could go for until I reminded her that it's almost enough to cover hotel and food for our 2 days precruise. I'm hoping to have another 300 before May so I can treat her to a spa day :D

 

Isn't it amazing how it adds up?

It sure is! I tried it once before (before cruising) for christmas gifts and was really surprised at how much the change doesn't get missed.

[reeran]

Brian,

You might want to check with your bank. Ours has a coin machine that is free to it's customers. I am happy about this because I hate to roll coins!! LOL

[spiflad]

I save aluminum cans. Why give them away to your local recycling program? I got a cheap crusher and save them in trash bags. About every 6 months I bring them to my local recycler and get money for my trouble. The other day the price was 54 cents per pound and I got $20.00 for them. It dosen't take long to add up and if you pick up a few strays it is even faster. You can sell any kind of aluminum.

[Sparky58]

Bank of America has a great program called 'Keep the Change'. It rounds up the amount of each purchase to the next dollar, and dumps the difference from your checking to savings account.

 

I am forever stopping the gas pump at an amount ending in .01 to get the max (99cents) transferred to my savings!!

 

It really is amazing how quickly saving your change adds up. Usually it's 3-4 hundred dollars. We 'cash out' our savings right before our cruise.

 

I also have a funnel-cup-piggy-bank from our last cruise. I throw only quarters into it for my onboard slot machine fund! :D

[reeran]

I save aluminum cans. Why give them away to your local recycling program? I got a cheap crusher and save them in trash bags. About every 6 months I bring them to my local recycler and get money for my trouble. The other day the price was 54 cents per pound and I got $20.00 for them. It dosen't take long to add up and if you pick up a few strays it is even faster. You can sell any kind of aluminum.

 

Funny you should mention this...there was an article in our local paper recently talking about how it was becoming cost prohibitive to maintain the recycling program. We've been giving cans to our recycling program because we thought the money helped the community but it sounds like it is just being eaten up in bureaucratic mumbo jumbo. At least with your way I know where my money is going…ummmmbbbrrreeeelllliee drinks!!!:cool:

[ksy8384]

We too save coins and one day we rolled them all and I took them to our bank. Imagine my shock/horror/dismay as I watched the teller empty all my rolls into the change counter. All that hard work.... lol.

[unatheo]

Pam- I also recently quit smoking too (may 10th - mother's day 2009) and was able to pay for the whole cruise (2 adults and 2 kids) with the cigarette money. Congrats and keep on quitting! I figured I could either pay for a family cruise or buy a big screen TV every year with the money saved.

 

We have always saved our change and you would be amazed on how quickly it adds up into a nice sum of money.

[simplelife]

Bank of America has a great program called 'Keep the Change'. It rounds up the amount of each purchase to the next dollar, and dumps the difference from your checking to savings account.

 

:D

That is a great program; too bad it's BOA. I'll never do business with them again. :(:mad: