'What's legal tender?' discussion

Brian_The_Lion

has anyone thought about this issue from another perspective...

Seeing as we are the UK do you think its fair on tourists to have so many variations of our banknotes in circulation? Have you thought how confusing it might be for a group of japanese tourists who travel to London and then up to Edinburgh for example?

Id love to know if foreign tourists are genuinely bamboozled by our "legal currency"

Does anyone know of any countries abroad that have so many variations of their notes issued by different banks?

jonnyb1978

Have to say that this scottish legal tender rule surprised me. I thought it was. I know lots of retailers who will not accept for the reason that their are alot of fakes about. Though i have to admit this would not be anywhere near a problem if the establishments actually trained their staff to a reasonable standard. I stood in disbelief when my Brother (who lives in Scotland) handed over a Scottish £20 in a bar only for the girl to walk away looking at the note funnily and proceeded to ask her colleage ' is Scotland in the EU'? The dim look on both their faces only confirmed they were going to reject it. He took the note back, downed his pint and walked out. Either there is a lack of training or a severe lack of general knowledge and common sense in the country today.

Brian_The_Lion

jonnyb1978 wrote: »

Have to say that this scottish legal tender rule surprised me. I thought it was. I know lots of retailers who will not accept for the reason that their are alot of fakes about. Though i have to admit this would not be anywhere near a problem if the establishments actually trained their staff to a reasonable standard. I stood in disbelief when my Brother (who lives in Scotland) handed over a Scottish £20 in a bar only for the girl to walk away looking at the note funnily and proceeded to ask her colleage ' is Scotland in the EU'? The dim look on both their faces only confirmed they were going to reject it. He took the note back, downed his pint and walked out. Either there is a lack of training or a severe lack of general knowledge and common sense in the country today.

There isnt training, thats the problem... But having said that it doesnt help when there are different notes from different banks... maybe scotland could just have one issuing authority? They could do a nice range with saltires on them! ::cool:

Im still a firm believer of it being to do with forgerys, etc... If something is unfamiliar then its human nature to treat it with caution... with english notes you can lift it to the light, etc for a quick check... or even the feel of the note is sometimes enough...

with something that you get once in a blue moon then its a different story, and as I said previously, this is an issue in scotland with NI notes as well as england with scots/ni notes. I dont care what the scots say, ive witnessed this with my own eyes in glasgow more than once and have also quizzed scottish people regarding it...

This discussion keeps going round in circles and keeps ending back at the door of england for some reason....

iomkeith

jimbms wrote: »

Fantastic another Manxman on here.

Well, not Manx born, but twenty years a stop-over! I remember hearing about the pub mixing up the Euro-pound exchange, although they probably got more valuable advertising in the news reports than they lost on the exchanges!

The issue with Scottish notes is not a racist thing, but purely, as suggested, a lack of familiarity. I grew up in Morecambe. During the 70's & 80's there were 'fairs weeks', where people from different areas traditionally went on holiday at the same time, because the mills, factories or shipyards in the area closed at the same time, so 'Bradford fortnight', 'Burnley fortnight' etc. 'Glasgow fortnight' meant the town was awash with Scottish notes and I doubt if anyone had a problem spending them because even kids, as I was at the time, recognised them. They would remain in general circulation, slowly dying out, over the next two or three months but even come Christmas, you wouldn't blink if one was offered to you in change.

greenpixie_2

At the cafe I work in I'm not allowed to take scottish notes, we used to when i first started working back in the day but the bank actually advised my boss not to take any because of the amount of fakes around. We even took a few because none of us personally know how to check and I have never be taught.

She is not legally required to take them, we have a big sign by the till saying that we do not accept them, but she is a big softie and if the customer doesn't have any other money on them we do normally take them, but that is at her discresion and I always make her check them so if they are fake I don't get blamed.

Even when I worked at Morrisons we never got taught how to tell if they were real or not and I was on the tills, we had to call a supervisor over to check them which i thought was ridiculous, makign the customer wait five minutes just so that they could check her money when they could of taught us how.

narty

StumpyPumpy wrote: »

Isn't this theory a variant on Mark Twain's "Million Pound Note" argument? If it what you say were true, I could walk into a shop with my (admittedly made up in both senses) million pound note and buy a pint of milk. As it is highly unlikely that a grocers outside of Knightsbridge would be able to give me sufficient change they would refuse my cash and I could waltz out with the goods and never need to pay for anything ever again. I don't believe the real world works like that.

SP

There is only the obligation on you to fulfil the contract, not on the shopkeeper to give you change. The shopkeeper, I believe, could just keep the £1m as full payment. Where did this idea that you HAVE to give change come from?

gozaimasu

Brian_The_Lion wrote: »

"not so long ago" - I think your whole post is a load of rubbish.... especially the fact that train drivers do not take fares... and find it extremely unlikely that "the driver" would announce something like that....

Are you sure you're not just making up a nice anti english rant?

I meant conductor (person who you show your ticket to, or buy one from). It was OBVIOUSLY NOT the driver, as drivers do not take fares.

I was glad that a conductor chose to welcome me back to Scotland with a nice chat about how other people are so ignorant, whilst members of such an ignorant people were sitting nearby. There is nothing wrong with me taking pleasure in that.

gozaimasu

lizalloareds wrote: »

Brian_The_Lion wrote: »

a hint for all concerned about having too many scottish notes prior to travelling south.... try and use non scottish cash machines, especially barclays and nationwide....

And for all you english haters out there... the scots do it too!!!

QUOTE]

why should people from scotland who are travelling down south try to make sure they have english money

i am not an english hater but i do object to being made to feel embaressed, i will continue to take scottish money when we go down south on holiday in july.

Why go on holiday in England with Scottish notes if they are going to refuse your money? Show appreciation of their racism by going on holiday to Ireland instead.

Money is paid into our bank accounts by our employers, who may be Scottish, English, Welsh or Northern Irish, and although at this point they are GBP, it's all just numbers.

As soon as you take cash out of a cash machine, you are discriminated against. Yes Brianthelion, Scots do it too, but I've never had any retailer in Scotland refuse an english note, only NI ones have been refused; poor NI, I can sympathise

The only way to avoid being refused a sale from note discrimination is to pay by card. You may be paid in Scotland and take out Scottish notes from a bank, but retailers will quite happily take the GBP direct from your bank account.

I don't accept the argument about refusal being acceptable because the english do not see enough Scottish notes to be able to tell which are fakes or not. There's the lack of education.

It's like a good few years ago when you would rarely ever hear a Scots accent on TV and it's why nowadays english people say they don't understand people when they have a scots accent. Being force-fed english biased media up north by the BBC means that we understand all accents, from Geordie to Scouse to everything else, but not even a perfectly enunciated English because it's pronounced in a Scots accent.

We should be accepting, celebrating and enjoying the union of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. Otherwise what's the point of it existing if we're all squabbling with each other?

StumpyPumpy

narty wrote: »

There is only the obligation on you to fulfil the contract, not on the shopkeeper to give you change. The shopkeeper, I believe, could just keep the £1m as full payment. Where did this idea that you HAVE to give change come from?

Err...I didn't imply they have to give me change, just that if they didn't I wouldn't complete the contract as I was under no obligation, contrary to what had been said earlier in this thread.
As you've asked: my idea comes from The Sale of Goods Act 1979 which states (amongst other things) in s8.2 [...]the buyer must pay a reasonable price. In the circumstances I detailed, £1m would not be deemed reasonable. And the Idea I can refuse this "deal" is borne out of s35 Acceptance I will not "accept" it, and will have met the conditions, detailed there (condition, time etc.) Therefore the contract is voided.

Where did you get the idea I was obliged to fulfill a contract of sale if the shopkeeper retained all my money??

I am not a lawyer, nor do I play one on tv and accept I may misunderstand some of the minutiae of sales law. I welcome anyone who can put me right there but only with proof, not speculation. That is not your fault, it is my nature: I am an empiricist.

anotherginger

i've just about stopped trying to pay with NI money in England, its not worth their stupid looks and the 'i'll have to get the manager'. i have also left rounds of drinks on bars because they are idiots. their loss!

i was on one of my many flights back to NI one time and the English couple beside me were asking for tips about where to go, what to see etc, and then got on to saying that they would probably visit more often if they didn't have to change their currency. cue a surprised look from me and a brief education on the differences between Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. they were a bit embarassed!