posted on December 6, 2000 08:40:55 PM new
I got a payment in the mail today from Germany for a small ticket item....total $8 (including shipping).
Everyone in my house looked at the cash sent and it appears that the three one dollar bills are phoney. We compared them with the ones we had here and they are slightly larger - the printing smears - it just doesn't look and feel right. The five looks fine.
My question is - what do I do now? Do I confront the buyer? Do I hop down to my local reserve bank and ask them to look at the money?
I know it's only $3 and I'm wondering if it's worth the neg I'm sure to get if I ask the buyer about it.....
posted on December 6, 2000 08:53:32 PM newPocono - that's kinda the way I was leaning....I keep thinking that I don't need the hassle - and the guy who sent it may not even know it looks funny...(then again he might) <sigh> just not my week.
Earlier this week, I had a bid retraction and found the guy bidding on the same thing lower priced after his retraction said 'unauthorized person using his id'. Then I had a bidder complain that a collectible lp was scratched when I know it wasn't. (I refunded anyway!)
Thinking maybe I should auction the funny money- can see it now:
posted on December 6, 2000 09:09:24 PM new
Please contact the US Secret Service office nearest you. It is their job to authenticate US currency. You can find their information in the government listings in your phone directory.
You won't get a lot of hassle from them when you contact them. They will look over what you have and, if it proves to be fake, will take down some information about who it came from and how you came to be in possession of it.
It would be very helpful if you would contact them. If this buyer is the one making the counterfeits then, after has passes some off and hears nothing, he'll probably figure that he got away with something and move to a higher denomination and screw someone else.
There are counterfeit detection pens available at office supply stores. But, as a way to check without expense, if you go to Sam's Club stores or other warehouse stores where a lot of cash is handled, the cashiers have these pens. You could explain to the cashier what's going and and ask her to swipe the pen across the bills. If they're fake a black mark, like a marker, will appear across the bills. If they're real, nothing will show. It has to do with the paper they're made of.
One easy check to know if the bills are real is to look carefully at the paper. Take a known good bill and look closely in an open, unprinted area. US currency paper has tiny red and blue fibers embedded in the paper. They are small and quite short but stick out lightly against the paper color. There aren't many on a bill so take a good look. Once you're used to what they look like, take a look at your questionable bills. If they aren't there, it's a fake.
There are lots of other ways to authenticate a bill but those couple of approaches are the easiest to do. Remember, this guy will get cocky and try it even more. You wouldn't want your paypal account frozen because of a stolen credit card so why would you want anyone else to be a victim of counterfeit currency?
Don't be afraid of the Secret Service. The authentication people are generally pretty cool, very nice and often pretty laid back. Informing them allows them to catalog the currency you received. When they start getting matches of same paper, serial numbers and ink they can build a case againt the person doing it. You'd be amazed at the file of bills the SS has. Thanks for listening. (By the way, I used to be a cop.)
posted on December 6, 2000 10:12:56 PM newAvaloncourt
I was in an Osco Drug today and saw the clerk using one of those pens on a $50 bill- I was wondering what he was doing....maybe I'll just stop by there tomorrow.
The paper does have the red fibers - but I can't see the blue. The letter that it came in has ink from the bills all over it. That's the part that really seems screwy - that and the bills being oversized (about 1/4" longer).
posted on December 6, 2000 10:41:00 PM new
There you go. Excellent place to check it out. The big guys get a little nervous around big bills.
The pen only reacts to non-currency paper and it's pretty foolproof. Back when the new series of bills came out, counterfeits showed up in the Carribean and the Mid-East (Gulf War era) that actually passed all of the normal indicators for counterfeit. The pen detection didn't work and they even had the polyester strip inside the paper on the large denominations. There was a lot of suspicions that it was a covert method by Iraq to dump a lot of fake currency into the market and a darn good quality currency it was. Iraq does have possession of Intaglio printing presses. The US currency paper is custom made of high concentration cotton rag which gives it a unique feel and smell and it wears forever.
I'd say if the ink transferred to the envelope in transit and the measurements are off then you've got an excellent candidate for a counterfeit.
I once saw a bill which was passed at a bowling alley bar. The counterfeiter tried hard to make it look real. It was $20 bill that was obviously injet printed but reasonable quality. The thing I liked best was that the person went to the trouble of drawing in the threads with a very fine red and blue pencil. The paper wasn't a good match though and stood out a bit and felt all wrong.
I really like the big, very expensive commercial color copy machines that detect currency and copy it but place black bars across it on the output.
posted on December 7, 2000 03:16:52 AM new
Jane -
The ink on REAL US money doesn't smear, run, or fade. You can run the bills through the wash in the piocket of a white shirt and nothing transfers to the cloth.
Definitely call the cops or (if you live in a large enough city), the Treasury agents. The buyer might 50s.
have been scammed by a German counterfiet ring ... but making DOLLARS?!!! That's a home-grown operation because the pros make 20s and
The buyer will probably get a visit from the German counterparts of our Treasury department
posted on December 7, 2000 05:39:02 AM new
If the bills are counterfeit, don't assume your buyer is aware of it. I remember when I first received payment from an American in the form of cash which included your new design of the $20 bill. I thought someone was trying to con me with phony money. I wasn't aware that your currency was redesigned.
I would think it would be a lot easier to con a German (your buyer) who is not familiar with your currency than it would be to con an American who handles American money every day.
I wouldn't neg the German because you don't know the truth.
posted on December 7, 2000 05:59:24 AM new
Anybody counterfeiting $1 bills has misplaced their creativity. Why not just send you a counterfeit $20 and ask you to send change?
posted on December 7, 2000 06:47:06 AM new
i agree with stockticker... its very possible that the buyer doesnt know that it may be a fake. i remember when the newer bills came out hearing lots of comments that they "looked fake". we see US dollars everyday, but id be very hard pressed to tell if currency from another country is real or not. i cant even begin to count how many times ive gotten a canadian penny and ive never even been to canada.
posted on December 7, 2000 07:36:28 AM new
You might just show it to your Bank,,They'll tell you.
Also, it might be helpful to let buyer know, so he/she will be aware when receiving US Money. If they are, say, swap-meet sellers, they may have been defrauded of their merchandise paid with "bad Money" JMHO
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