Coin firm pays it forward after Georgia man paid in pennies

MARIETTA, Ga. — A global company has stepped in to solve quite a “coinundrum” for a Georgia man.

Andreas Flaten’s former employer dumped at least 90,000 pennies on his driveway last month as a form of final payment for his work at an auto shop, he said.

When Bellevue, Washington-based Coinstar heard about his predicament, they decided that change was needed.

They picked up Flaten’s coins on Thursday and rounded up the amount to give him a $1,000 check.

They also made donations to two charities of Flaten’s choosing: two animal shelters.

“Coinstar has been in the coin business for 30 years and we process approximately 41 billion coins annually – so picking up 91,000 pennies was all in a day’s work,” Coinstar CEO Jim Gaherity said in a statement.

Flaten said his former employer — A OK Walker Autoworks in Peachtree City — owed him $915 after he left his job there in November.

He finally got his pay earlier this month in the form of thousands of oil- or grease-covered pennies dumped at the end of his driveway in Fayetteville, Georgia. Atop the pile: an envelope with Flaten’s final paystub and a goodbye note that featured an obscenity.

Flaten had been spending an hour or two every night trying to clean the pennies, which he stored in a wheelbarrow in his garage.

The owner of the shop, Miles Walker, told WGCL-TV that he didn’t know if he did or didn’t drop the pennies off at Flaten’s house.

“I don’t really remember,” Walker said. “It doesn’t matter. He got paid, that’s all that matters.”

Jeff Martin, The Associated Press