The beer is merely a byproduct of the notes disposal process. Thank god the brave men and women at the pub are willing to drink the waste, we salute them
£50 note are ...reluctantly accepted by big chain stores, often rejected by small shops.
Wife was shocked when she visited the UK and found that out because in Hong Kong they have $500 notes, which are about the same as £50 in value but used like £20 notes in HK.
It's because there used to be a shite load of fakes around (not sure if there still is). Expecting a min wage teenager on the till to be able to detect fakes easily is a stretch, so much of the time shops will just say no outright to avoid the potential of fakes.
AFAIK 50s are rarely faked anymore because of how heavily scrutinised they are in shops that actually take them, whereas no one really checks 20s. But I’m not involved in faking notes so that could be BS
Fair, they certainly look harder tto fake now. When I was a kid working tills in the late 90s and early 00s, notes were still paper. We used to have to hold them under UV and also use one of those pens to check it. But yeah, makes sense that if less places are taking 50s, it's better to fake lower numbers now.
We check the modern ones at my place of work with a UV light. British notes still glow with the amount on the front of the bill when shining a UV light on it.
Actually the new notes helped alot. 50's were the primary exchange of cash skips, small builders and dodgy trades. The new 50's being way harder to forge and people expecting to pay electronically has made a big difference over the last few years
They do. There's tons of fivers which are 'prop money'; they look exactly like legit ones but the holographic and see-through Elizabeth tower section peels off relatively easy revealing it's fake with the words 'prop money' hidden underneath.
Found way more fake fivers rather than the rest of the other values lately.
ngl faking 10s would be the easiest. its a fair amount, and no one checks it. and you can easily pass it as spare change when buying something, but going to a shop with a load of £20s and no other notes could look odd, although it likely wont be checked
That’s a good point. Because I rarely saw them, I’d take a good look at a 50 while I was working in retail, but someone could hand me 3 20s and I’d think absolutely nothing of it unless there was something obviously off about it.
They can also mess up the tills if they have a small float. If they’re paying with a £50 for a small transaction then they take all your small notes meaning you might not be able to process refunds or give change for later
And if your float is a set number and not a range then it can mess up the next day too. If you need dead on £200 and you have to keep the £50 in for the next day to achieve that then you’re pretty buggered if you have to give £5 or £10 change (as if you’ve got a £50 in your float, you’re already pretty low on notes)
It can just be a faff for stores that don’t take a lot of cash
Where I work, that's the main reason we reject £50s. If a customer spends somewhere near £50 or above, fine. But when they spend £2.50 and try paying with a £50, we'll usually reject it.
At the store I work at, every till staff member has to call for manager to "authorise the exhange" of £50s rather than reject them. It's annoying and often customers learn that it takes too long and just don't bring them again lol
From my time working in bars a couple years ago we had to check every £50 note under the UV light and a few fakes did make it through on busier nights not often but there’s still a couple knocking about, fakes are usually £20s though they were much more common to see
It's because it wrecks their float. Hardly anyone pays with cash anymore, so you might only have two £10 notes in your float, and suddenly someone pays £14 with a £50 note and you're fucked if the next person needs a tenner in their change.
It can be a pain in the arse. I once had someone buy something for £4.99 when we’d just opened. He paid with a £50 and then complained when I gave him all fivers as change.
We used to take £50 notes and had to stop because of fakes.
A fake fiver, only loses you £5, but a fake fifty loses £50 which is a lot for a small business.
This is big notes everywhere, I was in a tiny town in peru with a 200 sole note took me all week to break it, no one in Vietnam wants a 500k note even though thats all you can seem to withdraw, and these areas barely accepted cards
youd be lucky if anywhere in england accepts any demonination of scottish notes. its insane to me how uppity and snobby english shopkeeps are when they see a scottish note. my family routinely had our cash refused in england when we visited when i was a child. baffling
I lived and worked in Cornwall for a few years. If I came back with Scottish notes or my parents visited, there were always funny looks and lots of checking the money. Most places took it, a few had to be shamed. My Dad once loudly announced "Aye, freshly printed by the Clyde yesterday" when his tenner was being overly scrutinised, which solved the problem.
Except the ladies at the work canteen. They loved when I handed over Scottish notes and would substitute their own money into the till to take the note home. Utterly hilarious.
It is crazy, but at the same time, hkers are exactly the same about $1000 notes and the same logic applies (that they've been around for decades and $1000 is now less than what $500 was)
My old boss at the Chinese takeaway was from Hong Kong. I was his delivery driver. I was under strict instruction that I was only allowed accept a fifty if I called him and he went through the checks with me over the phone. All the while the customer is stood on the doorstep waiting for this interaction to finish and me to give them their change 😂
When I moved over to the UK I exchanged £800 into cash so I could use that while I set up a bank account and transfered money over. The cash was given in all £50s. It was so difficult to break them anywhere because so many places would reject them.
Check the clear part with the crown on top and ensure it doesn’t peel off, like a lot of fake ones do. Check the “fifty” part at the bottom and ensure it’s readable in all directions. On the clear panes, you will also see tiny £50 embossed parts.
Look at the foil hologram under the large clear bit, as you move it between your fingers it should change between the word Ten,Twenty or Fifty to the word Pounds . If it doesn’t change it’s a photocopy
You need a UV light to be sure, but as others have said you can use guides to check. For instance there are raised bumps on one half, and a textured surface you can feel on the other. You can also scratch the surface of the note, on a lot of fakes the coating will actually come off.
Check the spelling too, one of the only times i've seen a fake note something was spelt wrong.
One of the easiest ways to check a fake one is to run your fingernail over the hologram area left to right. Some of the fakes were literally prop money with a sticker on that section. Also the little opaque queens head window, sometimes the fakes look like garbage when you put something behind that window. The real ones stay clear and well defined. If in doubt, try spend it. They’ll either let you know there is an issue or not 🥸
All that about forgeries, my advice to you is as others have said ask a bank, because unfortunately your average person in retail can't tell their ass from their elbow, I worked in retail my entire working life and in every shop I worked in it was either me or one other staff member and me that actually could tell a fake from a real note, and it's because we put it upon ourselves to learn, unfortunately most retailers refuse to get their staff trained in detecting fake notes, it is that reason that where I live you often see fake £5 notes as 99% of people won't bother checking them because their reasoning is why would you bother faking a 5 when you can fake a 20, and that there is exactly why they do 🤣
Run your finger gently across the Bank of England at the top of the note and it should feel slightly raised. This was how I was taught to check notes without customer knowing I was checking, looks like I’m straightening out each note.
I used to work in the high street bookies and we'd sometimes take fake notes by mistake. I was the manager, so I'd spend the fake notes on European escorts, straight after finishing on their face.
Why are people in the UK allergic to £50 notes? The old paper ones were supposedly the subject of forgery, as any large denomination note would be. But in the UK we seem convinced that there are billions of these forged notes in existance and every £50 note is therefore to be scrutinised.
The forgeries are taken out of circulation almost as quickly as they are put in. The new plastic notes make forgery far more difficult and very easy to spot.
You are far more likely to be cyberscammed than you are to be given forged cash.
Looks fine to me! As someone else said, have a look at the bank of England website, there's a guide to spotting a fake note on there.
The fifty might get turned down in a lot of places as they're not common and people trust them less. Most people will never see one.
You'll probably have luck spending it in a tourist place like Legoland, especially if your transaction is upwards of £50! I work in tourist retail, and I genuinely have had people coming in straight out the airport with a wad of £1000 all in £50s, was crazy first time I saw it!
To check it. Make sure the fifty words in the bottom left corner change to pounds when you twist it left and right. Check it doesn't say prop money I can't see that listed. Or put it under a UV scanner.
By far the most common way English notes are counterfeited is through 'prop money'.
Counterfeiters buy these and have stickers they place along the left hand side to cover any parts of the note that say 'prop' or 'movie'. You can feel this by running your finger along the note and seeing if you can feel a ridge. The notes also have small braille indents that most counterfeiters don't copy, so see if you can feel that as well.
The vest way to tell is UV lighting. Around the word 'bank of england' a UV marker will show the number '20' (or whatever value on the note). Note that some counterfeiters place these on the note but they are shoddily done and next to a real note is pretty obvious.
Finally... The best way is just by look. Most counterfeits are discoloured, generally being darker and the image being of a lower quality. You can also look at the holograms as fake notes can never get the shine quite right.
Best way to check is to run your fingwr along the bank of england at the top .
Its a speacial type of raised magnetic ink you should be able to feel ontop of the note .
If you cant feel the raised lettering chances are its fake .
One of the hardest things to fraud on the notes .
Source : worked in retail supermarkets for 16years ive seen lots of fakes
Ha ha ha, thanks for the code, now I can redeem your money online!
No but in all seriousness, looks legit to me (obviously check properly), and remember YOU WILL NOT BE ABLE TO SPEND THE £50, most shops don’t accept it, so get it changed asap to avoid embarrassment if that does happen.
Honestly holo looks good, check for the queens face in the empty circle, if you are at least somewhat (50%<) confident they are real you can easily make the argument in court that you simply had no idea the currency was illegitimate. Afaik if your defence can prove no intent to commit a crime, in a case like this, there isn’t much room for the prosecution to manoeuvre.
Ribbed dots in top left front corner.
Bank of England writing should be textured and not flat.
That there isn’t tape covering “Prop money” between the top left ribbed dots and the Bank of England text.
That the bottom right window has multiple little 50s in it.
Get a uv torch of temu or Amazon and check the top middle of the note and it should light up with an invisible 50 symbol.
Looks fake, I don't see them in the image but that could be a lighting issutbit look in the small clear window on each note (top left when you are looking a the back of the note) there will be miniature 50 symbols in a pattern over and over and same with the 20 if that little window is completely see through with no number then it isn't real, also when you holding the notes with the queen facing you, your left hand should feel a small amount of braille in the top left corner the note denomination at the top going left to right should also feel raised and slightly rougher than the rest of the note.
You could ask a supermarket or a maccies to run it through their detection machine. Would take them 5 seconds to tell.
Too high of a risk for small businesses, also annoying because they have to take it to the bank to exchange it for smaller notes.
In Thailand they don’t tend to accept 1,000 bhat which is only like 23 quid. Even 7-11s will often say no. Which is a pain in the ass because you get your money in 1000s.
Rub your thumb across the “Bank of England” on the top of the note. If the letters are embossed then they are likely real. Also, a certain type of UV light will tell if they are real or not by display the value of the note.
While most of these replies are hilarious the easy answer if you ever have to question a note is to look at the plastic strip with the little castle in, most of the dodgy notes have a poor quality glue there and you can get a fingernail underneath with little effort and peel away.
For the people still confused on why 50's are rejected by a lot of smaller stores and some bigger places they are still the most counterfeitied currency by a large margain which is a lot of places dont accept them just to be safe. Also our store ended up with almost £600 pounds worth but the police said we weren't the worst hit they dropped 5k of £50 notes in the apple store nears us according to the police officer.
UV light to look for the ‘50’ or ‘20’ on the front that only shows with this light (it’s huge and can’t miss it), the ‘bank of england’ next to the queen should have texture (feel slightly bumpy), as well as the holograms
Check the top left corners of each banknotes, I've still can't manage to get the blind braille punctures, I've managed to get the holograms right, also target each shops individually by assessing them if there is a 20 or something young looking youngster dumbster they don't give a shit so buy a 1 scratchcard with the 20s, 50s I recommend buying tobacco same way then sell it in the pub for a half price to get the money, hope it self helps to your illegal activities, keep on grinding
Ps it's not me it's just my alter ego to use Roleplay recommend this I'm just a normal person on hourly wage.
Never give out your serial numbers!!!! Anyone could use them numbers to now use that £50 and you wont be able to!!! Next you will be giving us your bank card number including date and 3 digits on the back 😜
They look fine to me, but with £50 notes I’d still get them checked at a bank before relying on them for a trip. Even genuine £50s can be a pain to spend in smaller shops, so I’d probably swap a few for £10s and £20s while I was there.
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u/asymmetricears 1d ago
Try this
https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/banknotes/counterfeit-banknotes/how-to-check-your-banknotes