MEI Recycler

[darkinthepark]

I am considering purchasing an VN27D2RU5M - MEI $1-$20 Bill Acceptor & Recycler for one of my heavily used Royal soda machines so that my customers don't need to get lots of coins as change.  Does anyone use these on their machines?  if so, how reliable are they?  Is there a better recycler BA on the market?

[allen watson]

I just bought 2 and they are awesome. I was using the dollar coin for change  but it was a pain in the butt keeping them stocked.  Someone always thought that they were rare and collectible and would buy a pack of gum with a $10 bill just to get the coins.  I can say that sales have gone way up and it’s so easy reloading them.

[BTVFC]

I also bought 2 recently, as an experiment. I pay back in $5's and dollar coins from the changer. Because most folks aren't too keen on $1 coins in the US, I get most of them spent back in the machines.

[AZVendor]

Good luck to all of you.  If MEI hasn't redesigned and upgraded their recyclers then, as in the past, once they fail they are hard to repair and keep working.  While they are light years better than Crane's recyclers which are throw away units, the MEI units don't have a good track record when they begin to need repairs.

[Central Kentucky Vending]

ive had good luck out of them

[darkinthepark]

8 hours ago, AZVendor said:

Good luck to all of you.  If MEI hasn't redesigned and upgraded their recyclers then, as in the past, once they fail they are hard to repair and keep working.  While they are light years better than Crane's recyclers which are throw away units, the MEI units don't have a good track record when they begin to need repairs.

So it sounds like I should buy a new one and not a used one.  Where is the best place to get one new that has the best price?

[allen watson]

2 hours ago, darkinthepark said:

So it sounds like I should buy a new one and not a used one.  Where is the best place to get one new that has the best price?

I bought 2 rebuilt units from D&S Vending for $250 each. They are sold out of these but may get more   

http://www.dsvendinginc.com/

 

[lacanteen]

We inherited 80 of those heaps in an acquisition a year ago. 80% of our service calls to these machines were bill related. They jam, they get out of alignment, the slightest thing shuts down the entire bill acceptor. Also, we were always short bills in our DEX report which was eliminated when weremoved them. By eliminating them, and using $coins has gotten rid of a lot of headaches. Once the customers realize that we will continue to fill the dollar coins, they start using the coins to get rid of them, hence, more sales. 

I have 25 or so of these left to sell at $25 each. You must have a VN2700 bill acceptor to run them. If a customer doesn't want dollar coins, they can use a credit card because every machine that can have a reader, does have a reader. 

[orsd]

I’d put a cc reader before the recycler.

You'll pay more for service call on the recyclers than their service fees on the reader.

[darkinthepark]

13 minutes ago, orsd said:

I’d put a cc reader before the recycler.

You'll pay more for service call on the recyclers than their service fees on the reader.

I do have credit card readers on three of my machines, and we do $100 a week in CC sales between the three machines.  But many students do not have credit cards and still pay in cash.  Only one of my machines takes fives and gives dollar coins change.  I just like to give the students every possible way to purchase a drink...even if they have a 10.  How about one of those bill breaker machines?  

[darkinthepark]

55 minutes ago, lacanteen said:

We inherited 80 of those heaps in an acquisition a year ago. 80% of our service calls to these machines were bill related. They jam, they get out of alignment, the slightest thing shuts down the entire bill acceptor. Also, we were always short bills in our DEX report which was eliminated when weremoved them. By eliminating them, and using $coins has gotten rid of a lot of headaches. Once the customers realize that we will continue to fill the dollar coins, they start using the coins to get rid of them, hence, more sales. 

I have 25 or so of these left to sell at $25 each. You must have a VN2700 bill acceptor to run them. If a customer doesn't want dollar coins, they can use a credit card because every machine that can have a reader, does have a reader. 

Thanks for the offer George...but if your machines are not working well, I would rather purchase new with a warranty.  

[57thTom]

41 minutes ago, darkinthepark said:

How about one of those bill breaker machines?  

At twice the price.

https://www.capitalvending.com/Vending-Machines-New-Refurbished-Complete-and-Working/Dollar-Bill-Changers-for-Sale-front-and-rear-load-Rowe-American-and-tube/American-Changers-c-957/new-american-changer

 

[lacanteen]

1 hour ago, darkinthepark said:

Thanks for the offer George...but if your machines are not working well, I would rather purchase new with a warranty.  

A Coke bottler bought 50 of these from me and sent to MEI repair center first. I think it's throwing good money after bad, especially with cashless becoming more accepted. Our cashless sales has topped 30% and continues to grow. That's a lot of quarters NOT being counted. 

[darkinthepark]

1 hour ago, lacanteen said:

A Coke bottler bought 50 of these from me and sent to MEI repair center first. I think it's throwing good money after bad, especially with cashless becoming more accepted. Our cashless sales has topped 30% and continues to grow. That's a lot of quarters NOT being counted. 

Yes, but remember my machines are at a 9-12 high school.  I'm happy that we are doing $100 cashless a week, but we still rely heavily on cash sales.  I just want to make things easier for the students.

[orsd]

4 hours ago, darkinthepark said:

Yes, but remember my machines are at a 9-12 high school.  I'm happy that we are doing $100 cashless a week, but we still rely heavily on cash sales.  I just want to make things easier for the students.

Quarter increments on pricing.

Mars CF7000 changer, 3 dollar tubes, a quarter and a nickel tube.

Done. Most of those dollars end back up in the machine anyways.

[lacanteen]

12 hours ago, darkinthepark said:

Yes, but remember my machines are at a 9-12 high school.  I'm happy that we are doing $100 cashless a week, but we still rely heavily on cash sales.  I just want to make things easier for the students.

I understand the difficulties of vending in a high school. What is the cell phone policy at your school? There's Apple Pay, Google wallet, Android wallet, etc. 

[BTVFC]

13 hours ago, darkinthepark said:

Yes, but remember my machines are at a 9-12 high school.  I'm happy that we are doing $100 cashless a week, but we still rely heavily on cash sales.  I just want to make things easier for the students.

Small operators with a limited customer base should do what is necessary to maximize sales. Do what you need (within reason) to make customers happy. No need to operate like you have hundreds of machines & multiple routes.

[Southeast Treats]

I played with recyclers for a while, and still have a couple out.  I do like the MEI, but any recycler is more finicky than a normal validator.  If someone feeds in a poor quality bill it is more likely to jam on the way out.  Plus, people are leery of putting a 10 or 20 into a machine; and you also have to deal with "refund requests" from people who will claim the machine took their large bills.  Going forward, I only plan to use them on higher price point machines if at all.  If you accept fives and return dollar coins as change, and offer cashless with contactless options like apple pay, you are going to cover 99.9% of all customers with fewer problems.

[darkinthepark]

5 hours ago, lacanteen said:

I understand the difficulties of vending in a high school. What is the cell phone policy at your school? There's Apple Pay, Google wallet, Android wallet, etc. 

Our Nayax readers accept apple, android and google pay.

[darkinthepark]

The machine that I would put this on has an older Coinco CA that doesn't give dollar coins and an older MARRS BA that will only take ones.  Instead of updating both the BA and CA, I was going to put in a recycler that would take 1, 5 and 10s and give 1s change.  I currently don't have a machine setup to take 10s.

[AngryChris]

The recycler mounts to the bill acceptor, so you'd need a mars vn 2700 or coinco's late model bill acceptor (vantage?).  For probably over $600 for both the bill acceptor and recycler, you are paying about as much for a new vn 2700 and cf 7512.  In my opinion, a vn 2700 and cf 7512 with dollar coin tube is a far better deal in every way.