1 in 40 chance pound in your pocket is fake

More than one in every 40 pound coins in circulation is counterfeit, the Royal Mint revealed yesterday.

Watch out for fakes Watch out for fakes

This represents £375million in fakes.

And the problem is getting worse, threatening to undermine public confidence in the currency.

Annual surveys show the ease with which criminals are pumping millions of fake coins into the system.

In 2002, fakes accounted for one in every 100 coins sampled by the Royal Mint. By 2007 it was one in 50 and last year it had risen to one in 40 – the highest figure since the one-pound coin was introduced in 1983.

Counterfeit expert Gerry Day said one of the reasons there were so many fakes is because the one-pound coin is made from a single alloy of metal.

He urged the Royal Mint to switch to a two-alloy design similar to that used for two-pound coins.

Mr Day said: “You can never stop forgers but you can make it more difficult and expensive.

“The Royal Mint should seriously consider changing the pound coin to a two-metal coin. They are much more expensive to counterfeit. The pound coin as it is, is too easy to copy. The quality of them is getting better.

“Some fakes are so good they are even slipping through the banks’ filters.”

Mr Day estimated the cost of setting up a counterfeiting operation was about £10,000, which could then churn out fakes at a rate of about 100 an hour.

He said: “The coins cost about 30p each to make and sell for about 80p.”

Royal Mint officials are in talks with the Treasury and police about the problem.

Martin Cragg, Royal Mint head of corporate affairs, said: “A number of measures are being undertaken by the Royal Mint with third parties to combat counterfeiting, including HM Treasury, the banks, vending operators and law-enforcement agencies.

“In particular, we are considering whether it would be appropriate and helpful to issue further publicity material which may assist the public and others to identify counterfeit coins.”

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