Pete

I don't see the point other than the wrapper will protect the contents from scratches and rubbing. My concern however would be over time what leaches out of the plastic and starts to tone your silver. Some plastics have a limited life expectancy and can become brittle or degrade in UV light ( daylight and maybe LED lighting nowadays ) Some plastics will be inert but perhaps unusable for heat sealing in a vacuum food sealer. I would suggest to research this very carefully before jumping in.

How about buying some small silver bars that are e.g. 1, 2.5, 5 and 10 gram ?

Definitely avoid the half ounce coins as they can often cost about as much as some 1 ounce. I suggest you hand your kids £2 ordinary coins then they can convert say 12-15 of these to a one ounce silver bullion coin. Having a mix of these would be akin to having a £50 and a £5 note in your wallet. If your kids needed to sell a silver coin you could swap for £2 coins and keep the silver until the next exchange the other way.

We definitely lack shops selling coins and bullion in the UK unlike the USA. Your best bet is to place a wanted listing in the UK trade section on this forum and you will get responses from many people who have proven themselves to be trustworthy. Check their feedback status. Also with VAT on silver now you will find forum prices hard to match through any shop or dealer who add significant margins because of their overheads, staff costs and business profit.

I have no experience with grading but this cannot possibly get a PF70 surely !! I though anything PF or MS 70 described perfection i.e. FDC but your coin looks awful - sorry. Don't shoot me for saying so but I am only using unqualified observations but if I had bought this I would be rejecting it.

Make a specific gravity test

I have never bought from Direct Bullion in London but regularly see their TV adverts so I checked their website and spoke to an advisor. Firstly most of what they show as in stock they don't seem to have and I was directed towards what was described as the "follow-on series from the Queens Beasts" I was starting to get excited until I noted they were a St Helena issue. Gold is gold but this is not the next series following the QB surely ?? Anyhow does anyone reckon this is a coin series worth collecting ? Has anyone used Direct Bullion and what do you reckon ?

You sew your oats where you reckon they'll do best. Is you postcode in a wealthy part of the country ? Targeting those with cash to burn makes sense if that's how they have applied their filter. Definitely cheaper that TV advertising and now we know, as we always did, why they need to sell heavily marked up coins as their overheads must be disproportionate considering the volume of unwanted glossy flyers they send out with expensive luxury paper covering letters. 😂

The high premiums on silver ( and platinum ) right now are governed by availability of coins and what the market will bear. Spot price is not so high and the cost of mining continues to rise so what we pay for our coins in a kind of way is not connected to spot, unlike gold. When supplies are restricted most dealers will increase their prices because people will still buy. In the UK we are screwed with 20% VAT but on the resale market the price of silver can still be competitive, albeit everyone's prices are higher. As for newbie stackers or collectors of date run sets you can place a

Technically a pre-2013 silver Britannia would not be classed as investment grade bullion if the definition requires the alloy to be 99.9% pure. This terminology probably relates to banks holding hundreds of thousands of tons and just trading silver contracts. A Britannia pre-dating 2013 is a collectible coin and has significantly more value than just an ounce of fine silver even though it contains a full ounce and that's why it is a bit heavier. As an "investment" the earlier Brits are certainly paying handsome "dividends" now.

Border Force VAT reclaim centre in Coventry. Fill out their form on-line and you will get a refund if the commercial invoice shows gold coins. Normally takes about 3 - 4 weeks for a response.

Dozens of posts on VAT in the UK following Brexit - search this site if you want more details. Buying from any business UK or EU today you will be charged 20% VAT on silver. The differential VAT scheme is used extensively in the EU meaning next to nil VAT on coins but you will be hit with 20% importing them in to the UK. Secondhand silver can be taxed at 0% but our UK dealers just add the difference to the premium. Your cheapest silver can be bought on this site or eBay but worth checking Chards and some others for prices.

The sealed pouch that contains the bar is your problem finding a neat box. I have a couple of empty Perth Mint one ounce bar rectangular tubes - solid white polythene type. Inner dimensions 47.5 x 27.5 mm and 63.5mm depth so contained 20 bars. You can always put a protective separator between naked bars to stop them rubbing. Unfortunately having just checked the Una bars are too large to fit.

VAT on silver in Germany is actually 19% ( I think ) but the bullion dealers manage to invoke the differential VAT loophole meaning VAT is minimal or absorbed in the premium of the coin, but not possible with bars. Same in Austria and Belgium and maybe some other EU countries. We in the UK have to pay an additional VAT of 20% on top because none of our dealers seem willing to follow those in the EU. When we were in the EU we still paid 20% VAT so this isn't anything to do with silver ( and platinum ) being industrial metals it is all about using / not using the tools available to lower V

The primary purpose to stack any metal is to both retain its "purchasing power" value and hopefully be able to sell for a profit in the future. Ignoring premium stuff and sticking to bullion - the real issue with silver now in the UK is the VAT of 20%. You may have to hold your silver for a very long time before you can ever expect to sell and not loose money since a dealer will not pay you the VAT element. So you may end up choosing to sell privately but if you need to shift 1,000 ounces or more that takes a lot of work. If silver ( and platinum ) was VAT free then stack silver ( and