Beware Counterfeit $20 Bills

[sixmile]

I was behind a woman trying to pass one at a local consignment store yesterday. The clerk noted someone had tried to use one last week, also.
It was a twenty dollar bill which looked normal but turned brown when inked with a counterfeit marker pen.
I'm probably just being alarmist, but be careful, nonetheless. Tis the season. I live in Florida, but it's happening elsewhere.

See this:
http://www.wktv.com/news/local/34993494.html
Utica man charged for passing counterfeit money in New Hartford
'A 20-year old Utica man has been charged in New Hartford after police say he tried to pass counterfeit money at Staples in Consumer Square.
The New Hartford Police Department say they arrested Mohammad Masood Bahrami, 20, of Utica, and charged him with one count of criminal possession of a forged instrument, and one count of petit larceny, after an investigation into the passing of a counterfeit twenty dollar bill at Staples.
Also seized from Bahrami’s apartment were a computer and scanner and a large amount of additional counterfeit twenty-dollar bills.'

And this:
http://www.kingmandailyminer.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&subsectionID=1&articleID=28427
Someone in the Kingman area found a way around their short cash-flow problem. Two counterfeit $20 bills were turned into the Kingman Police Department by area stores on Nov. 23 and 24. Both bills had the same serial number.

The department is encouraging everyone to take extra precautions against the possibility of fraud during the holiday season, including taking a second look at that dollar bill in your hand.

[truedelphi]

1. Rolling Stone had a neat article about

How the proliferation of small, accurate personal computers, scanners and printers resulted in a wonderful life for many. Some college students in Ohio supported themselves quite nicely - until the concept of the special pens to detect counterfeiting came along.

If they had known when to quit, they would have done quite well.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. what are you to do if you give a clerk a 20

and he finds that it is counterfeit? Does he call the cops immediately?

[pitohui]

3. yeah probably what do you do if he SAYS that it is counterfeit?

some of those so-called markers are crap and give false reads, and also there have been scams where a clerk helpfully confiscates your "counterfiet" $20 but offers not to call the cops -- guess, what you've just been robbed by the helpful clerk

yeah right

considering the costs of manufacturing a realistic looking twenty (the correct kind of paper), i don't lay awake nights worrying about twenties, the so-called counterfeiters around here, it's always something moronic, like some idiots think their home computer can create a bill that can pass, rolling stone or no rolling stone, i'm sure that worked just fine in 1984 but it's not yesterday any more

[Chan790]

13. Well as a retail clerk...

We're instructed to call the police. It's for our protection and yours. It's only illegal to knowingly pass counterfeit currency...realistically, in that situation you're going to have to go to the police station and give a statement...and tell them where/how you received the counterfeit bills, if you know. It'll ruin your day, but unless you've been running all over town distributing fake $20 bills in substantial quantities (usually a fairly good indicator that you're involved) you aren't going to be arrested. You're just out some $ and the hour it took for the cop to interview you and get a statement. Don't leave the scene after we've called the police...it's a crime to leave the scene of a crime...and you are also a victim.

You're not necessarily out the $ long-term either as almost all counterfeiters are caught and the law in most jurisdictions is set up to make it easier for you to sue the grafter to recoup your material losses and expenses.

We use the pens...they might suck and give false positives but rarely or never false negatives. (That is...sometimes real bills register as fake, but fake bills never register as real.)

Counterfeit, altered, "washed" or stolen checks are far more common. I've seen 2 or 3 (at least) of each of those...but never a counterfeit bill.

[SoCalDem]

4. They call the manager, and confiscate the $20.. I doubt that they "accuse" you

since you might have received it in change, and did nto even know.. but either way, you are out $20..

I once was given a $100 counterfeit by the bowling alley, I do business with every week.. I called the owner from the bank (where I was in the process of making a deposit for my leagues).. I told him to get his ass down to the bank with a "good" $100..(he was my friend, so I could talk to him that way).. He made it good, but from that moment on, I never let the bowling alley collect fees from my bowlers, and give the league our due at the end of the night.. I make them pay ME, and then I pay the bowling alley direct..never had another counterfeit since..

[Lyric]

11. The procedure at our old store was this:

If a bill was suspected of being a counterfeit, the first thing that happened was that the cashier would bring it over to the office, so that the office staff could confirm it. If it was confirmed as a counterfeit, then the store manager was called down and the customer was *asked* (not ordered) to talk to the manager and give him contact info, etc. The reason for this is twofold--first, only the Secret Service can absolutely say for sure whether or not a bill is a fake. If the bill turns out to be legitimate, we'd need contact info in order to return the money to the customer. Secondly, if the bill was indeed a counterfeit, the Secret Service would want to contact them in order to try and find out where they received that particular bill.

Honestly, a large percentage of counterfeit bills are passed by people who have no idea that their money isn't real; counterfeiters tend to put their fakes into circulation in places that do a lot of fast cash transactions, involving minimally-experienced employees, like fast-food joints and convenience stores. Those places in turn will give the bills back out as change to unsuspecting customers. The Secret Service is pretty good at figuring out which people are innocent dupes and which people are counterfeiting criminals.

[AZBlue]

12. No. The bill does have to be confiscated though and turned in.

And you have absolutely no recourse.

[timtom]

5. ALL $20 bills are counterfeit, as far as I am concerned.

(Just my indictment of the Fed and its phony money)

[peacetalksforall]

7. About a year ago there was an article about the CIA making counterfeit money

with a lot of speculation surrounding it - on DU.

[NNN0LHI]

6. Things are pretty bad to take a chance of getting 20 years in Club Fed for twenty bucks

There are better ways to make a living.

Don

[flyingfysh]

8. "counterfeit marker pens" are nonsense

These are heavily promoted to gullible store owners as being able to detect counterfeit money, but they are worthless.

All they do is put some iodine on the bill. If there is starch (often present in cheap papers), a chemical reaction turns it brown. But a genuine $20 bill, if accidentally sprayed with common laundry starch, will "fail" the same test.

[Tesha]

16. Then it just advances to the next level...

Is the fluorescent Mylar strip embedded in the paper, is it fluorescing
with the correct color and does it match the denomination of the bill?
That's a pretty good indication that the bill is real.

How about the microprinting around the portrait? And the watermark?

If the bill's real, your "false positive" marker-test will be corrected
quickly enough.

Tesha

[Lyric]

9. Both my partner and myself have worked handling money.

My partner was actually an office manager at a grocery store, and handled thousands every day. The idea that a "brown" mark means that it's counterfeit isn't entirely correct.

If the pen makes a *dark* brown or black mark on a bill, it's probably a counterfeit. A light brown or amber mark means that it's probably legit. Just saying "brown" is misleading, because perfectly legitimate bills will be stained a light brown by the pen. For anyone who isn't sure, just remember--a DARK-colored brown or black mark is something to worry about, not a light one.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

10. Thanks

I was thinking of getting one of these pens for our office--it is a health clinic, and sometimes we're paid in cash. But since we know all our patients, I've not gotten one. However, they could pass on a phony bill without knowing it.

[uppityperson]

14. If you have a questionable one, or a question, send it to me.

I'll let you know if it is real or not.










:evilgrin:

[L0oniX]

15. Save them for your church collection plate.

:evilgrin:

[RC]

17. 8-)

:thumbsup:

[jmowreader]

18. There's a new source for "funny money" paper

My wife used to work as a cashier, and started running into a new kind of counterfeit currency. They use computers and color laser printers to make the money, but they get the paper by bleaching out a $5 bill. To detect THIS kind of fake, which gives a good reading on a counterfeit-detector pen, you hold it up to the light. The government's printing press puts fine indentations in the surface of the sheet. When someone prints a $50 over a bleached $5, all the indentations are there but they're in the wrong places.