MONEY MATTERS
Check EVERY £5, £10 & £20 note for series of specific numbers which makes them worth hundreds more
Scroll on to discover what notes - and coins - are worth more than their face value
BRITS have been urged to check the serial numbers of every £5, £10 and £20 notes as they could be worth significantly more than their face value.
Most people pay little attention to the money in their pocket or wallet but they could be carrying around a tidy sum and just not realise it.
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Some are worth much more than their face value due to the serial numbers they have on them.
For collectors, notes with a low number on them are highly prized and can sell for significant amounts of money.
Specialist dealers London Coins sold a lot comprising a £5, £10 and £20 note – with a face value of just £35 – for a whopping £340 in June 2020.
What made them so valuable was firstly that they all had the Lowther Special prefix of QM10.
Read More on Rare Banknotes
Merlyn Lowther was the Bank of England’s chief cashier from 1999 to 2003 and was the first woman to hold the post.
All three notes had very low serial numbers.
The £5 note, featuring George Stephenson, had serial number QM10 010003.
The £10 note, with Charles Dickens, was marked QM10 000003.
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While the £20 note, displaying Sir Edward Elgar, had QM10 000003.
British bank notes have the serial number printed on the top left.
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New banknotes featuring King Charles started entering circulation recently via a number of Post Office branches.
The notes are slowly replacing ones with the late Queen Elizabeth II's face on as they become worn out or to meet an increase in demand.
The £5 notes entering circulation with the prefix CA 01, found on the bottom right of the note, are particularly lucrative.
Spink and Son sold off some of these £5 notes produced by the Bank of England (BoE) in a special auction.
Separate auctions for the rarest £10, £20 and £50 notes will be held on June 27, July 11 and July 24 respectively.
One of the notes, with the serial number CA 01 000003, sold for a whopping £11,000.
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Meanwhile, nine other rare £5 King Charles III banknotes sold for up to £7,000.
Arnas Savickas, head of banknotes at auctioneers Spink and Son, said the most sought-after serial numbers for the four different notes will start from:
- £5: CA 01 000003
- £10: HB 01 000002
- £20: EH 01 000002
- £50: AJ 01 000003
If you land one of these serial numbers you could expect to earn potentially thousands of pounds.
It's not just banknotes that can be worth a pretty penny either, coins can also be worth a considerable sum.
Some of us may have rare coins hidden in wallets or down sofas and they could be worth a bit of dosh.
All 2p coins struck between 1971 and 1981 had the words "new pence" on the reverse side of the coin, according to the Royal Mint.
After that, the wording was changed to "two pence".
But in 1983, a small number of coins were mistakenly struck with the words "new pence" again.
How to check if a coin is rare
IT's time to check the loose change in your wallet and your pockets for rare coins.
But how exactly do you spot one? The Sun's senior consumer reporter Olivia Marshall explains.
In most cases, a coin is rare if it has a low mintage figure - which is set by The Royal Mint.
The mintage figure relates to how many of the coins were made, so the fewer there are of them, the rarer they are.
You can find out what coins are rare and how they look on The Royal Mint's website.
Your next step after this is seeing if the same coin is still available to buy in superior Brilliant Uncirculated quality from an official Royal Mint distributor, according to Change Checker.
These coins have been specially made to a superior quality which differentiates them from other coins you might find in your pocket.
That glitch has made these coins extremely valuable for collectors.
So you'll need to look out for a coin from 1983 that says "new pence" - other coins won't be worth anything more than 2p.
The Royal Mint doesn't know how many there are in existence, but if you have one in your change, you could be well and truly in the money.
The rare 2ps coins have been known to fetch up to £1,000 at auction in the past.
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If you can't find this particular 2p coin, we've got the ten most in demand coins and notes right now which could be worth up to £388.
Plus, we have revealed the rarest and most valuable Olympic coins to look out for ahead of Paris 2024 worth up to £1,000.
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