Plastic tenner: You’ve got less than a week to spend your old paper £10 notes

Time to get shopping: there’s now less than a week to go until the paper £10 note is no longer legal tender.

The Bank of England has said the old tenner, which features Charles Darwin, will officially have its legal tender status withdrawn as of one minute before midnight on 1 March.

The Bank earlier this week said nearly three quarters of the £10 notes in circulation were the new polymer note, but more than £2.1bn worth of paper notes are still floating around the UK.

The new tenner went into circulation in mid-September and features the novelist Jane Austen. It is two and a half times stronger than the paper version and has features helpful for blind and partially sighted people.

Some banks and building societies may accept the paper tenners at their own discretion after 1 March, the Bank said, but most retailers will no longer accept the old note as payment.

The introduction of the plastic £10 note followed the new £5 note, which went into circulation in September 2016.

In 2020 the plastic £20 note featuring JMW Turner will complete the new set as the Bank is not making a plastic £50 note.

Read more: Way too much information on the new tenner