Recently my bank stopped supplying me with $1 coins and soon I will run out of them to fill my $1 coin tubes. I was told that the mint has stopped shipping them. I need them because some of my busiest locations use $5 bills alot and the dollar coins provide enough change to prevent change starvation. I thought of getting bill recyclers, but at $600+ a pop, it's a bit too pricey for me. I read another post that suggested putting $5 (4 ones and 4 quarters) in small envelopes and place them in one of the candy slots of a snack machine. The customer, realizing that using a $5 bill will return a ton of quarters in change, will have an incentive to buy the $5 with a $5 bill and then use the ones and quarters to pay for another selection (thereby helping to prevent change starvation). Well I thought about this idea long and hard and I came up with a detailed strategy that might solve my problem. After you read it, let me know if there are any flaws in the strategy.

STEP 1 --> Convert all my coin mechs to have at least 3 quarter tubes.
STEP 2 --> Place a sign near the bill insertion hole that says "$5, $10, and $20 bills also accepted; change given in coins. DOLLAR COINS NO LONGER GIVEN IN CHANGE. Change can be purchased at Selections D6, D7, and D8."
STEP 3 --> Place in one of the candy selection columns envelopes containing $5 in cash in the form of 5 nickels, 7 quarters, and 3 ones. Sell this for $5.
STEP 4 --> Place in another one of the candy selection columns envelopes containing $20 in cash in the form of 5 nickels, 11 quarters, 7 ones, and 2 fives. Sell this for $20. (Because this entails quite a bit of cash, limit the number of envelopes to just enough to cover what is needed between vending runs.)
STEP 5 --> Place in another one of the candy selection columns envelopes containing $1 in cash in the form of 5 nickels and 3 quarters. Sell this for $1.

THOUGHTS ON THE STRATEGY --

1) By accepting tens and twenties as well as fives, I think the sales lift would be noticeable. I don't know how noticeable, but I have a hunch that it would be substantial. I've had it happen to me on many occassions that while at a location, a customer would ask if I had change for a $20 so that he can buy something from the machine.
2) With the three candy selection columns selling change amounts of $1, $5, and $20, anyone seeing the "Exact Change Only" indicator can buy the change he needs and proceed with his purchase. Providing nickels in the change packages will insure that the customer will have the exact change needed.
3) Providing more coins than bills in the change packages will make it more likely that the customer will use the coins to make his purchase and thus help to replenish the coin mech.

So that's it. Do you think this will actual work or is it too crazy?

I have a GPL 159 snack machine that sometimes vends the left-most column and the middle column at the same time when either selection has been selected. It happens at every tray including the candy tray in which case the 0 and 4 columns vend together and the 1 and 5 columns vend together (0 being the left most column). At first, it went away after I test vended the affected columns. A few days later I discovered that the problem came back. But test vending did not fix it that time. Then I replaced the main board and the problem went away or so I thought. On my next route run, I stopped by to check the machine. IT CAME BACK! I shut the machine down for about 10 minutes while I poked around the insides. After turning the power back on, the problem went away again. This is where it stands now and, needless to say, it's getting REALLY, REALLY AGGRAVATING. If anyone has any idea as to why this is happening and what I can do to fix it, please let me know.

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