Polymer £50 note enters circulation

The Bank of England has revealed that 30 September 2022 will be the last day you can use Bank of England paper £20 and £50 notes. After this date, the paper notes will no longer be legal tender, so it is encouraging people to spend them or deposit them at their bank ahead of this date.

The Bank of England’s chief cashier, Sarah John, said “The polymer £50 note is the most secure Bank of England banknote yet, and the features of the note make it very difficult to counterfeit. All of our polymer banknotes can be checked by looking for two key security features: a hologram which changes image; and see-through windows. So if you can check one denomination of banknote, you can check them all. The new £50 notes, like the polymer £10 and £20 notes, contain a tactile feature to help vision-impaired people identify the denomination.”

The note, which bears the face of legendary World War Two codebreaker Alan Turing, has been specially delivered to Bletchley Post Office to commemorate the work done by Turing and his team at Bletchley Park that was critical to winning the war.

Ahmed Butt, postmaster for Bletchley Post Office, said: “It’s great that the town’s residents and visitors can get their hands on the new £50 note at our post office before it goes into wider circulation across the rest of the country.

“Many of my customers feel more comfortable dealing in cash and the great news is that anyone with the old £50 note can still come into post offices and deposit them into their bank account, even after the old note is withdrawn by the Bank of England.”

Marc Terry, international managing director for Cardtronics, the largest ATM provider in the UK, added: “The launch of the new £50 is a clear sign that cash is alive and well and demonstrates the Bank of England’s clear commitment to the UK’s essential cash economy for many years to come. The predictions of a cashless future are not only misleading, they are dangerously incorrect and risk alienating huge swathes of society. Over 8 million people are believed to rely on cash for their day-to-day lives so safeguarding the future of cash is clearly extremely important.”