Money forgers’ tricks that can be hard to spot

8:38am Wednesday 28th May 2008

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FORGED notes have been tendered across the region with a high number of reported incidents in Southampton city centre, Woolston, Hedge End and Botley.

Taxi drivers have also been targeted by the forgery fraudsters.

Retailers told the Echo that tricks used to pass off the worthless notes as genuine include ruffling up the paper to make it appear used and inserting fakes inside layers of genuine cash as they hand over money for goods.

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How to spot a fake £20 note

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Kevin Shovelar owns The Sweet Market Ltd Newsagent, in the High Street, Southampton, and is on the Southern District Council of the National Federation of Retail Newsagents.

He said: "I was at a district meeting recently and we were shown examples of these notes.

"With the fakes, the reverse of the note is pinker than usual. The £20' hologram to the left of it is usually white, but in some of the fakes shows up as black.

There is also a difference in the quality of the paper."

Rachel Mooring, the floor manager at Accessorize, WestQuay, recently reported a young man who had disguised a counterfeit £20 note in a bundle of real notes.

Suspicious of the large amount of money being handed over, she checked the notes using an ultraviolet detector pen and found one of the notes that was paper-like' in texture to be fake.

Staff at Poundland in the Marlands shopping centre, Vida's Wines in Woolston and Pizza Hut in Southampton have all reported the use of fake notes too.

Richard Pead, store manager at Co-op, Woolston, said that a couple of months ago they had an influx of fake £20 notes but there had been no problems recently and staff were being extra vigilant.

Many local businesses now have antifraud equipment to combat fakes, including ultraviolet pens and cash scanners.