A Dublin charity has spent the last four years repatriating non-euro currencies to raise money for life-saving medical equipment for children.
Koins for Kids was founded by Liam Duggan and has a team of four volunteers who have been fundraising in Dublin and around the country.
They are raising money for a new paediatric MRI scanner for the National Children's Hospital which is estimated to cost around €1 million.
Liam told Dublin Live that he came up with the idea while he was studying in Trinity College Dublin.
He said: "During my lunch breaks or whatever time I had away from lectures, I decided to sit on Grafton Street, generally on a Saturday, with this crazy cardboard sign collecting ones and twos, foreign coin.
"It wasn't personal, it was just something that I wanted to do. I had come out of a dark space and I wanted to do something for society.
"It's more about what you give than what you get in this world."
The charity has officially raised €260,000 but they have a huge bank of coins still to be repatriated.
Liam said: "I have here 50 kilos of coins that we collected today. I'm the one who sorts it out and does all of the donkey work but there's four professionals in the background.
"I have a good knowledge of coin at this stage, so I can find a silver coin if it comes in or anything that might be worth selling off for more than face value."
There are dozens of public collection points for the charity all over Dublin.
Liam said interest is growing in the charity and they're collecting coins every day.
"It's really snowballing at the moment because people are out and about and have organised to de-clutter their houses and get rid of some unwanted coins.
"I've just spent all of my day, maybe 14 hours a day, going around collecting the boxes or sorting the foreign money out. It's just basically a process that we have to help the innocent sufferers on this island."
The charity is entirely voluntary, so 100% of money raised goes towards the fund for the equipment.
Liam said he would like to thank the hundreds of thousands of donations that has brought Koins for Kids this far over the past four years.
You can find a list of public donation points for Koins for Kids here and a Paypal donation link here.
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