Insane queues in Canberra outside Royal Australian Mint for $2 coin worth $1500

An avid coin collector drove hours and queued up in a line for an entire night, but was left disappointed with the final product.

A coin collector who drove hours and queued up in a line for an entire night to get his hands on a rare $2 set has been left fuming after discovering the item was damaged.

Maurice Mattei went through the ordeal to land himself a limited-edition, 35th anniversary $2 coin set from the Royal Australian Mint, based in Canberra.

But when he got home after the 2.5 hour drive, he noticed a massive scratch on the face of one of the coins.

That was despite the $235 he paid for the privilege.

The $2 coin clearly shows a scratch on the Queen’s cheek bone.

He believes it was damaged in the Mint’s drums during the production.

Mr Mattei is especially annoyed because he has previously bought a 12-coin set and it was a lot cheaper – $75 – and also didn’t have any scratches on it.

The scratch on the Queen’s face is visible.

The limited edition coins were an instant hit.

“There are scratches on the head from where they’ve been bumped around in the drums,” Mr Mattei told Yahoo Finance.

“The last 12-coin sets were in much better condition and much cheaper.

“For that sort of money, they should’ve made a special batch for just them and handled them with more care. Not just pick them out of the drum and stick them in the folder.”

Mr Mattei claims these rare coins are now being sold online for up to $1500.

In a statement to the publication, the Royal Mint defended its decision to sell the coins.

“The standard of the collection has been assessed by the mint’s quality control team, and deemed to meet the mint’s quality standards for this class of product,” a spokesperson said.

The queues Mr Mattei battled with.

Some Australians love their coins.

It comes as other coins have ended up being incredibly valuable thanks to errors in the Mint’s processing line.

Last month, news.com.au reported that Aussies should check their pockets as an unlikely error on a $1 coin would render them worth thousands of dollars.

Australia’s $1 coin, which was first introduced in 1984 to replace the $1 note, features a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II on the obverse, soon to be replaced with the likeness of King Charles III.

Its reverse side, meanwhile, features five hopping kangaroos, known as the iconic “Mob of Roos” design by Stuart Devlin.

But, of the 5.1 million “Mob of Roos” $1 coins minted in 2005, just a handful had a surprisingly obvious error.

The die that was used to impress the error coins during production drastically missed the mark, resulting in a dollar that was struck about 10 per cent, or 2-3mm, off-centre. It means that part of the design on both the obverse and reverse side has been chopped off, while the other half is home to a wonky-looking blank space.

They have been listed on eBay selling for as high as $6999.90.