YOU could turn a tenner into a £3,600 windfall with the right serial number printed on the note.
An eagle-eyed eBay seller realised they held a particularly rare variation of the £10 note with its set of digits – and sold it for 360 times face value.
The special £10 note was snapped up for an eye-watering £3,600.
The note had the rare AH prefix followed by the numbers 1775.
That seems unremarkable, until you consider plastic tenners since 2017 have featured a portrait of the legendary novelist Jane Austen, who penned Pride and Prejudice.
Her year of birth was 1775, making those numbers alongside her portrait strongly sought after.
The note was one of the first to feature a woman aside from the Queen.
It began to circulate in 2017 on the 200-year anniversary of Austen’s death, also featuring the famous line: “I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading!”
It came in to replace a cotton paper note featuring a portrait of Charles Darwin, withdrawn from circulation in 2018.
Others have also posted Jane Austen notes to eBay for thousands.
Currently, a Nottingham seller has one listed for a mind-boggling £5,255.
It has the serial number: AJ20 753817.
The first two letters represent the initials of the author, albeit in reverse, while also including numbers 17 and 75 – combined, they make her year of birth, 1775.
Meanwhile, a Salisbury seller has listed two notes – featuring Austen’s birth and death digits – for a much lower £1,000.
The first note has the numbers 1775 in order, while the second has 1817, her year of death.
It comes just weeks after King Charles bank notes were thrown into circulation.
The Bank of England starting printing them in late 2023, but they are only just being rolled out.
It’s estimated there are still billions of Queen Elizabeth II banknotes circulating, so the monarchs will co-exist on notes for a long time yet.
The current reverse designs, along with Austen on the £10, include: Winston Churchill on the £5, JMW Turner on the £20 and Alan Turing on the £50.
The letter and number combinations printed on the note could significantly bump up its technical value.
In the case of £10 notes, since they feature Jane Austen, letters with AJ or better yet, JA could skyrocket their worth.
Numbers indicating her birth or death year are attracting eye-popping prices, so look out for 75, her birth year, or 17, the year of death.
But it’s warned a note printed with a code such as “JA17” could be a while away yet.
According changechecker.org: “Whilst these will likely become popular with collectors in the future, it could be many years before notes with these serial numbers enter circulation due to the huge amount of possible combinations that would come before ‘JA’.”
The website says the serial numbers you need to look out for are:
Jane Austen notes are not the only ones that might be popular with collectors – who should also keep their eyes peeled for James Bond 007 notes and AK47 notes.
Consecutive numbers such as AA12345 are also well sought after.
