Have any cash lying around? You might want to make sure it’s real.
A string of fake bills is circulating throughout Greenwood, and it has caused several major businesses to trade counterfeit for the real stuff.
According to Kevin Hayes of the Greenwood Police Department, Bypass Liquor, Greenwood Utilities, Walmart and at least one McDonald’s location have already been hit with fake money.
Hayes said this happens about once a year in the city.
He described two ways that money is illegally reprinted. The first way is easier to catch. “They have a printer that copies on both sides, and they just print the bill double-sided,” he said.
With that kind of counterfeit, you can hold up the bill and look for two signs that should be there. One is a bar on the left side that should give the dollar amount of the bill. On the right side, there should be a watermark by the president’s face. Without those two signs, there’s a good chance you’re holding fake money.
The other kind of counterfeiting makes things a little more difficult. “People will bleach a $5 bill; then they’ll copy over it with a 50,” said Hayes.
That kind of reproduction is harder to identify because the bill feels real, since it’s printed on real money rather than generic copy paper. It also has watermarks, but they aren’t the right ones; the bar on the left will have a five instead of a 50.
Stores generally carry marking pens that help identify fake money. Cashiers and other bill handlers sometimes forget to check incoming cash, but it’s important, Hayes said.
Hayes said it’s unlikely that people will be reimbursed for counterfeit money, even though they weren’t the ones who printed it.
“You can go to the police and file a report,” he said, “but the person filling the ATM won’t always give you money back.”
Police have no leads yet on who is making the money. Last year, according to Hayes, the suspect was printing fake cash from Chicago. “It spreads really fast,” he said.
Hayes said another good thing to remember is to check the serial numbers of bills. Each bill printed by the U.S. Treasury has a unique serial number. If all of your bills have the same small digits printed in their left-hand corners, you’ve got less money than you thought you did.
• Contact Jeanie Riess at 581-7235 or jriess@gwcommonwealth.com.
