Redbox and Coinstar in Canada, Scotiabank ATMs in 7/Eleven

It is surprising that no mention is being made of a significant change in ATMs at 7/Eleven. They were the exclusive domain of CIBC but now Scotiabank machines are being moved in coast to coast. Now, normally this would not seem a big deal but the fact of the matter was the CIBC ATMs doubled for President's Choice bank from Superstore.

Score one for Scotiabank but fewer choices for those with PC or CIBC cards.

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In the last several weeks, Coinstar has been moving their machines into Safeway. It is a coin counter that charges just under 12% to process your collection.

Now if this seems steep, look at this from the U.S. page of the company and not the Canadian page:

 For Coins to Cash™ service, we charge an 9.8% processing fee in the United States, a 11.9% processing fee in Canada, and a 8.9% processing fee in the U.K. Some retailers or financial institutions may choose to subsidize this fee. Coin counting is free in select regions of the U.S. if you convert your change to a nationally-branded gift card or eCertificate.

Holy high interest rate there, Robin!!

No option for free in Canada, no subsidy from retailers in Canada and no gift cards either. What a racket. With 600 machines in Canada, you figure that somehow they could get sponsors to make this free and at least put gift cards in place.

Just another example of Canada seems to be gouged on price of services and goods.

Safeway seems to have scored a deal though. In addition, DVDPlay is being yanked out of Safeways in favour of Redbox DVD which Coinstar owns.

Redbox charges 50 cents higher in Canada than the U.S.

The hits keep on coming. It remains to be seen whether the selection is better in Redbox than DVD play.

The aftermath of Rogers and Blockbuster closing continue to be felt.