Many self-service checkouts do not accept £50 notes due to concerns about counterfeiting and the need for high-value change. However, some newer machines, especially in supermarkets like Tesco, Sainsbury's, and Asda, do accept them, particularly if they have updated banknote validators for polymer notes.
Yes. A shop is under no obligation to sell you anything, nor to sell it to you at the price on the label. They can choose to refuse your note because a display of priced goods is merely an "offer to treat" - to negotiate a deal - although negotiating the price of a Mars bar downwards doesn't often work.
Shoppers who use £20 or £50 notes have been given a six month warning. A warning has been issued to anyone who still uses cash to pay for their shopping. If you use the wrong notes at shops like ASDA, Tesco, Aldi, M&S or Morrisons from September, your transaction will be rejected.
A shop owner can choose what to accept. If you want to pay for a pack of chewing gum with a £50 note, it is perfectly legal to turn you down. Likewise for all other banknotes, it is a matter of discretion.
How to check £50 banknotes – key security features
Are 50 notes still accepted?
This note replaces our paper £50 note which was withdrawn from circulation after 30 September 2022. You may be able to deposit withdrawn notes at your own bank or with the Post Office. Alternatively, you can exchange withdrawn banknotes with selected Post Office branches or with the Bank of England.
According to the Bank of England's latest statistics, a total of 344 million of them, with a combined value of £17.2bn, are in the system. While this makes them the least used notes in transactions, it means they are only slightly less common than £5 notes. There are 396 million £5 notes in circulation.
The Bank of England has given a September 30 deadline whereby paper £20 and £50 notes will no longer be accepted. It means shoppers using paper notes to pay for items in stores such as Tesco, Asda, Aldi, Lidl and M&S will have their payment rejected. The paper notes in current circulation were first issued in 2007.
£100 notes have not been issued by the Bank of England since 1945, but they are issued by some banks in the Channel Islands, Scotland and Northern Ireland.
"Unfortunately, in the past we have had people chancing their luck with fake notes so we have to take care with high value money. "Thankfully, we don't get customers using £50 notes very often. "On each occasion our staff use their judgement and in this case they chose not to accept it.
A number of branches have a Cash & Deposit Machine (CDM) which lets you do more than a normal Cash Machine. You can use your bank card or credit slip to pay in up to 50 cheques and 50 notes in cash. A £3,000 daily limit and a £24,000 annual limit applies to cash deposits. Learn more about cash limits.
The Bank of England £100,000,000 note, also referred to as Titan, is a non-circulating Bank of England sterling banknote used to back the value of Scottish and Northern Irish banknotes. It is the highest denomination of banknote printed by the Bank of England.
On the £20 and £50 notes there is a second, smaller window in the bottom corner of the note. Below the main see-through window on the front of all the notes, there is a silver foil patch containing a hologram. When you tilt the note from side to side, the words change between the value of the note and 'Pounds'.
The Bank of England has issued a warning to shoppers ahead of the September 30 deadline whereby paper £20 and £50 notes will no longer be able to accepted. Anyone using paper notes to pay for items in all retailers including Tesco, Asda, Aldi, Lidl, M&S and Morrisons will have their transaction rejected.
Many self-service checkouts do not accept £50 notes due to concerns about counterfeiting and the need for high-value change. However, some newer machines, especially in supermarkets like Tesco, Sainsbury's, and Asda, do accept them, particularly if they have updated banknote validators for polymer notes.
"legal tender" is anything that can be used to pay a court debt. Shops are under no obligation to accept it, and can accept payment however they choose. That also means they can reject payments however they choose.
Shops tend not to accept them because there are so many forgeries out there. It was the same with £20 notes a couple of decades ago when they were "rare" - lots of shops wouldn't take them. Fifties are seen so infrequently that you don't know if it is a forgery or not.
About £6.6bn in old banknotes has not been cashed in across the UK, even though the paper £20 and £50 stopped being legal tender in October 2022. Paper banknotes have been replaced with plastic notes with a series of security features.
When the note is tilted up and down, the images move from side to side and the number 50 and £ symbol switch. If you look at the front of the £50 note under a good quality ultra-violet light the number 50 appears in bright red and green. The five windows of the motion thread also appear bright green.
All supermarkets will take a £50 note as payment. Its not that unusual as there are many builders etc out there that work for cash. Therfore they pay in cash.
The Post Office Opens in a new window will accept most old notes as a deposit into any UK bank account you can access with them. There are also 50 Post Office branches across the UK that will swap old banknotes, even if you do not have a bank account.
Here's how to avoid such a scenario from September if you're shopping at the likes of ASDA, Tesco, Aldi, M&S or Morrisons from September. By then, your transaction will definitely be rejected because that's when the old £20 and £50 notes will have been officially replaced.
