If a message came in from home saying the cedi notes are changing on 3 November and asking what to do about the money you sent, this is the answer: nothing.
The Bank of Ghana is bringing in a new set of banknotes on Tuesday 3 November 2026. They are called the Heritage Series. The notes have stronger security features and are built to last longer in circulation. That is the whole of it.
The notes your family already has are fine
On 25 September 2026, the Bank of Ghana’s head of currency, Dominic Owusu, said it plainly: “Both the old and the new will continue to be legal tender until further notice.” The old notes and the new notes will circulate together. There is no date to swap them in. There is no rush.
The Governor of the Bank of Ghana, Dr Johnson Pandit Asiama, told people the same thing at the announcement the day before: do not rush to exchange or withdraw the cedis you hold. If your family has cedis in a drawer, in a wallet, in a market till, they stay good.
If a rumour reaches you that a 500-cedi note is coming, that is not true. The Bank of Ghana said on the same day that there will be no 500-cedi note in the Heritage Series. Only the notes already in use are being upgraded: the 1, 2, 5, 10, 20, 50, 100 and 200 cedi notes.
The money you send does not touch new notes
Almost every UK-to-Ghana transfer today lands in an MTN Mobile Money wallet or an AT Money wallet, not in physical cash. Those wallets do not hold paper notes. They hold a balance on your family member’s phone. A new banknote design in Accra does not change the balance on the phone in Kumasi. Your transfer arrives the same way it always has.
If your family cashes some of that balance out at a MoMo agent, they will start to see the new notes in the drawer over the next few weeks, next to the old ones. Both spend the same.
The one small thing to watch
Around 3 November, cash counters and forex bureaux in Ghana will start seeing the new notes alongside the old ones for the first time. That covers banks, the currency exchange bureaux on the high street, and the physical cash-pickup counters run by MoneyGram, Western Union and RIA.
If your family is collecting a cash payout at one of those counters and the clerk takes a moment longer than usual to check a note, that is what is happening. The agent is not refusing your transfer. They are looking at a design they have not seen before.
If you can, tell your family to receive the money into their MoMo wallet that week instead of at a counter. It is faster, and there is no cash to inspect. If MoMo is not an option, the counter payout will still work; it may just take a few minutes longer than usual.
If someone at home is worried
The plainest thing to send back is: the money is fine, the notes at home are fine, the mobile money wallet is fine. The Heritage Series is a design change, not a currency change. If they need to spend cash, they can spend it. If they want to keep cash for later, they can keep it. Neither choice loses them a pesewa.
The Bank of Ghana has not named a date on which the old notes stop working, and it has said openly that it is not planning to. Until that changes, the cedis your family has are the cedis your family has.
For how to send the next transfer, and what each app charges into MoMo, our Ghana guide has the current picture.
Corrections
- 2026-09-29: An earlier version of this page said the Bank of Ghana had asked cash-handling businesses to train their staff on how the new notes look and how to check them. The Governor’s statement (24 September 2026) appeals to businesses and the public to handle banknotes with care – it does not include a training-on-features instruction. The section has been rewritten to describe what will happen at the counter without attributing an ask to the Bank of Ghana that its statement does not make.