There is less than a week to go until the old round pound coins cease to be legal tender and on Monday, October 16 shops will no longer be accepting them.

However, it has been revealed that some of the country's supermarket giants and rail companies are still unprepared for the new £1 coin.

It's been six months since the new coin became legal tender and yet Tesco and Sainsbury's have admitted they have still haven't modified all their trolleys to accept the 12-sided coin.

The supermarkets said trolleys at smaller stores — such as some Sainsbury's Locals and Tesco Expresses — have yet to be updated, reports the Daily Mirror online

You won't be able to use your old £1 coin after October 15
You won't be able to use your old £1 coin after October 15

Sainsbury's told the Sunday Times "internal logistic problems" were to blame. And train companies have admitted some ticket machines still won't accept the 12-sided coin.

Many ticket machines operated by Govia Thameslink Railway, which runs Southern, Great Northern, Gatwick Express and Thameslink, are still not ready for the change.

Transport for London said some of the ticket machines on its Overground and tram services were unlikely to be ready for the new £1 coin until the end of the year.

The new £1 coin, which was designed by a Walsall schoolboy, came into circulation in March as part of the Royal Mint's efforts to cut back on counterfeits.

As many as 50 million fake round pounds were in circulation in January. In a recent statement, the Royal Mint revealed no new £1 coins have so far been forged, to its knowledge.

But experts recently told Mirror Online of the five special editions of the round pound, which we shouldn't ditch. The Cardiff City £1 coin has a mintage of just 1,615,000 and they each could soon by worth around £15.

However the round pound coin will go out of circulation in less than a week's time and shoppers will no longer be able to use them at retailers. Instead you'll need to head to the bank, building society or a Post Office branch to have them traded.

Video Loading

Here's what you need to know about the new £1 coin:

It was designed by a Black Country schoolboy

The Treasury launched a competition for a new design, and the winner was Walsall schoolboy David Pearce. He was aged 15, and a pupil at Queen Mary's Grammar School in Walsall , when the winner was announced in March 2015.

Competition entrants were asked to create a design which symbolises the UK and David beat off fierce competition from more than 6,000 entries with a design that takes in four well known symbols of the UK - a rose, a leek, a thistle and a shamrock, emerging from a Royal Coronet.

It will now be used on the "tails" side of the new £1 coin being introduced in 2017, with the traditional image of the Queen on the reverse.

The new 12-sides £1 coin came into circulation back in March this year
The new 12-sides £1 coin came into circulation back in March this year

It has a "hidden security feature"

The Royal Mint says the new coin is particularly hard to counterfeit. It has a number of special features making it hard to copy, including being 12-sided and having an image like a hologram that changes from a ‘£’ symbol to the number '1' when the coin is seen from different angles. This is called a latent image.

The coin also has tiny lettering on the lower inside rim on both sides of the coin. On one side this says "one pound", and on the other it has the year of production.

And the Royal Mint says the coin has a "hidden security feature". This mysterious "high security feature" is "built into the coin to protect it from counterfeiting in the future," says the Treasury.

The round £1 coins are good until at least October 15

The existing round £1 coins will be returned to The Royal Mint - and some of them will be reused to make the new coin. Businesses are being asked to accept both the new £1 coin and the old round ones until October 15.

From October 16, they are "under no obligation" to accept the old £1 coin, and should not give any of the old coins out.

If you still have round pound coins left after October 16, don't worry. You can still deposit them in your bank.

Some banks might impose limits on how many of the old coins they will accept after October 16, but this shouldn't affect ordinary domestic customers. Despite this, the Treasury is encouraging people to spend or bank their round coins by the end of October 15, just to be sure.

If you want to know more head to www.royalmint.com

Looking for a job? There are thousands available at www.Fish4.co.uk