COLLECTORS love error coins as they are produced in such low numbers – meaning they’re difficult to get hold of.
The Royal Mint manufactures between three million and four million coins a day though, so mistakes will often happen and can rock up in your change.
6
They might go unnoticed because they’ll still pass through people’s hands as legal tender.
But sometimes a coin is misshapen or the design printed is misaligned and more and because that’s not supposed to happen, there won’t be many like it around.
Sometimes bidding wars break out on the most highly sought-after copies so you could be quids-in if you find one.
It’s definitely worth checking your own change to see if you have any odd ones that would peak the interest of a collector.
But from one day to the next interest can change, so there’s no hard and fast guarantee you’ll be minted, snapping a rare one up.
In any other circumstance a 50p is worth exactly that – 50p. But is a coin features a unique twist that means it’s more in demand than any other then it will go for above face value.
RARE COINS AND VALUABLE NOTE
Other listing examples found on eBay can give you a good ballpark figure of how much you could earn though, and some are in their hundreds.
We’ve taken a look at the highest listings that can be found on eBay currently and ranked the rarest out there.
But remember that buyers can always pull out of sales, which means the coin advertised won’t have sold for what it says it has.
Plus there’s fakes to look out for as well.
Change experts like Coin Hunter or Change Checker will help you verify if it’s real though
They can also help place a value on the coin if you’re looking to list, yourself.
Here’s what’s sellers have managed to rake in from rare coins on the online auction site:
Double Queen head – worth £550
6
One standard copy of a 50p coin has been minted with an error that makes it look like a double take.
The coin was struck three times and in a way that looks a bit like two coins are overlapping.
The error means that you can hardly make out the design on either the reverse or obverse, so there’s not much to see of the Queen’s head or the seated Britannia design.
Something has likely gone wrong in the minting process meaning after it was struck once, the coin hasn’t been ejected so it received another strike that it shouldn’t have.
But that flaw has only risen the value as one copy that had this exact error sold for £550 on eBay, as a bidder considered it worth over 1000 times its face value.
Double Britannia – worth £510
6
Similar to the last, this design was struck twice.
The errors on the 50p make both sides look a bit like two coins are overlapping again, but it’s also made one side of the coin stick out further that its original mould.
One with this error sold for an impressive £510 on eBay though, despite being faulty.
You might spot one like this yourself as the shape means it won’t fit into something like a vending machine or a parking meter – but you could be quids-in so it could be worth the lost chocolate bar or more.
Error Benjamin Bunny – worth £255
6
The error on this coin meant that it’s left the Queen’s head in a different direction on the obverse to the design of Benjamin bunny on the reverse.
The Benjamin bunny coin is one of four 50p coins that were released in 2017 to celebrate famed author Beatrix Potter – coins with Peter Rabbit, Tom Kitten and Jeremy Fisher on were also released as part of the collection.
25 million of the coins were minted, so alone it won’t usually go for much more than £2.60 even though it already has a different design to usual.
But finding one with a mistake is more likely to make you a mint.
One copy sporting the error sold for as much as £255 on eBay.
Error Olympics Aquatics – worth £233.88
6
The Royal Mint released 29 new 50p designs to mark the London Olympic Games, each depicting a different competitive sport – one being the aquatics 50p.
Ahead of the coin’s release in 2011, the Royal Mint redesigned the aquatics 50p to show less water crossing the swimmer making their face more visible.
But a small number of coins were accidentally struck with the original design and entered into circulation – just like this one that has been spotted on eBay selling for 468 times more than its face value.
A buyer snapped it up for £233.88 after bidding on the online auction site.
Nobody knows exactly how many of the error coins were mistakenly made, which makes them even more valuable to a collector and others have sold for hundreds more in the past too.
Error Kew Gardens – worth £721
6
The Kew Gardens 50p is one of the most sought after on the coin collecting circuit, and it tops Change Checker’s scarcity index as the rarest of 50ps.
On the reverse side of the coin it features an image of the Chinese pagoda that stands at the heart of the London attraction it’s named after.
In total, only 210,000 exist from when the coin was minted in 2009, so collectors will only come across a genuine copy once in a blue moon.
But one seller has claimed to find a rare error copy, even more unique than normal.
After listing it on eBay they managed to bank £721 for the version – over 1,400 times more than the coin’s face value and plenty more than the rare coin usually goes for on the site.
Rare coins and valuable notes – is yours worth a mint?
I found a rare silver Liberty coin in a roll – and it could be worth up to $XXX
