Job Discussion Forums

[thrifty]

I have just come back from buying my beer and had to stop at the d�viz first. As I was waiting there were two people ahead of me involved in an incredibly complicated transaction which involved a huge amount of YTL-they must have been buying dollars or euros. The man in the d�viz returned one of their 50YTL notes because it was fake.

Now that miserable note is going to be foisted on some sucker and so on and so.

In the UK aren't shops and banks etc. supposed to seize a fake note and hand it over to the police?

Why do Turks do so much of their dealings in cash and hence get robbed and ripped off all the time?

Mustafa is buying a new car so he does a dodgy deal where he pays for it in cash and gets a few quid knocked off the price. He withdraws his money in cash from the bank, puts it in a Migros bag and travels 3 hours on overcrowded buses and dolumşes. He hands the money over and gets no receipt. Asking for trouble, no?

I have mentioned this to the wife before and she gets really exasperated and says something like:

"hayret birşey ya! Kafan hi� �alışmıyor. Allah bana sabır ver ya! Oof Allah yardım et bana." And she has a degree in economics.

[Freddie Miles]

Fake 20ytls are quite common and it is like a game of musical chairs in Turkey. Taxi drivers seem to be a rich source of the counterfeit bills; the reason being in the dim light of the back seat of a taxi after another night of bar crawling, one is presumably less discerning than any other time.

I do worry about getting phoney money from ATMs since after working hours, there is little you can actually do about it. Normally, you are supposed to take your lumps and immediately report the incident to the police, but, of course, there is always the temptation to try to fob it off on the next person as soon as possible.

By the way, is this where the term "passing the buck" comes from?

[FGT]

According to a Turkish bank manager friend of mine the law in Turkey is that as soon as a fake note is spotted the police should be informed and the path of the note stopped (and I guess checked back).

Does it happen? No.