The free oyster money has reminded me of a vending machine at the Students Union at Reading which, one of the games group discovered, would treat the fifth 2p coin given to it in any one transaction as a 10p.

So, stick five 2ps in it and you'd be credited with 18p, not 10p. This sort of discount got me breaking my 'no less than 70% chocolate' rule.

Presumably either news of this 'feature' didn't spread too far or the machine didn't give a decent report of its activities, because there was never a report to the Buildings & Finance Committee (which I was on as Treasurer of the lighting crew) about any discrepancy.

I wonder if the machine is still there.