HSBC to stock £5 notes in cash machines

One of the UK's biggest banks today announced plans to stock £5 notes in nearly 400 of its cash machines.

HSBC said it was introducing the notes to a further 210 of its ATMs across England and Wales during the coming two months.

The move follows a trial carried out by the group with the Bank of England in 2009 under which 100 of its cash machines in the South West and Midlands dispensed the notes.

The Bank of England is keen to get more £5 notes into circulation due to a general shortage of the notes and the poor quality of those that are used.

There are currently around £1.25 billion-worth of £5 notes in circulation in the UK, or 249 million notes, compared with 640 million £10 notes and more than 1.5 billion £20 ones.

Because £5 notes get used more regularly than higher denomination notes, they have a much shorter lifespan, with the average £5 note lasting for only one year before it becomes too damaged to use, compared with £50 notes which last for five years or more.

All cash machines can dispense £5 notes but the majority of banks chose to load them with only £10 and £20 ones, as these notes tend to be better quality and using them means the ATM does not need to be restocked as frequently.

But a report from cash machine network Link said yesterday that all of the UK's largest banks and building societies that operate ATMs had now put in place plans to start dispensing £5 notes from their cash machines.

It added that HSBC, Barclays and Lloyds TSB, which already dispense the notes from their ATMs, planned to dispense more of them.

The HSBC cash machines dispensing the £5 notes will be labelled and customers withdrawing between £40 and £100 will typically get at least two of the notes.

The group said branches involved in last year's trial reported a significant increase in the number of £5 notes being paid back into the branch by local businesses.

It said this suggested that the initiative had succeeded in boosting the number of the notes in circulation locally, as businesses no longer felt the need to hoard them for change.

An HSBC spokesman said: "Improving the flow and quality of £5 notes is important, businesses don't want to be left short and customers prefer newer notes.

"By clearly labelling the £5 dispensing machines and increasing their number to almost four hundred, the vast majority of customers across England and Wales will now have easy access to good quality £5 notes."