Is a grocery store cashier allowed to deny pennies as a form of payment?

[Anonymous]

Suppose a customer bought groceries for $100. And he or she only had their coin collection as payment, in which the cashier is forced to count 10,000 pennies. Can a cashier deny this payment even though pennies are a legal form of currency?

[hahahmm]

Yeah. Counting 10k pennies takes time. The store is not geared up to pay an employee just to count pennies. If you went to a bank there's a machine to count change. Some stores have a self-serve change counting machine which takes the coins & creates a receipt. You take the receipt to customer service and get cash minus a service charge.

When I was a cashier (eons ago) if someone had tried to get me to count even $2 worth of pennies I would have said 'nah'. Actually, I might have felt sorry for them and just given them the $2 item BUT it actually comes out of the cashier's pocket when you do that.

[MrOracle]

Yes, they can deny such a payment. Even a bank has specific procedures for any significant amount of coins, and you are required to follow their procedures if you want to exchange or deposit more than a handful of coins at a time.

[jamesgoldman]

I believe so

Here in the UK you legally can only pay up to
20p in 1p/2p
£5 in 5p/10p
£10 in 20p/50p coins
£1 and up is unlimited

[Anonymous]

Amazing that pennies still exist in the USA. About time, they moved with the times.

[BarryLiverstone]

They may need it to be rolled like at the bank. But if it needs to be paid in pennies they can let other customers pay and you would have to wait a long time while they count it.

[Anonymous]

Yes. Private businesses reserve the right to refuse service to pretty much anyone for any reason that otherwise isn't protected by anti-discrimination laws.