But I just want change

August 15th, 2008 at 02:33pm Alex Gary

A few weeks ago I needed to break a $50 — which for a journalist is big money — and wandered to the nearest bank branch from the Newstower.

Since I was going to get change, I decided I’d buy a roll of the gold presidential dollar coins — by the end of the year the U.S. Mint already will be up to No. 8, Martin Van Buren.

But when I walked up to the teller and asked to break the $50, he asked me if I had an account there. I didn’t so I was told the policy was to only make change for people who have accounts with the bank.

What? I asked. I wasn’t looking to take any money away. I just wanted different kinds of money.

“That’s our policy,” I was told.

So I trudged back down State Street and, crossed the river, and found another bank.

Unfortunately, that bank had the same policy. I wondered if I was on to something big. Had a small courtesy to the public had gone the way of the full-service gas station.

Turns out I was just unlucky. There are 18 different banking institutions with branches in Rockford. I called a branch from each one and found 13 will make change without requiring an account. The five that told me over the phone that an account is required were JPMorgan Chase, Associated Bank, National City, Firth Third and Riverside Community Bank.

That’s not really a surprise because four of the five are very large regional or national banks. I looked on the Internet to see if any research had been done on this trend and couldn’t find any.

I’m not taking these banks to task — I assume it’s a guard against accepting counterfeit bills or a staffing issue. I’m just pointing it out in case you want to buy some of those gold dollars — the Andrew Jacksons are really sharp. To save time, you might want to hit a smaller, locally-based bank first.

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