Why are Indian shop- and hotel-keepers so obsessed with checking if your rupees are genuine.
Whenever I buy something people are holding notes up to thelight, turning thrm around and sometimes giving them back to me and asking for a better one.
Not just big notes- even had it happen with a 10 Rp note yesterday!
The 500s and up are because they are commonly counterfeited. It's common in the States, I'm sure it's just as common in those places in Australia where they use currency as money.
The last you wrote is just stupid, however... Most people won't take torn bills of any denomination.
I was told - perhaps wrongly - that one in five paper notes in India is counterfeit. I was also told that when a business turns their notes in to the bank they eat the cost of any counterfeit bills the bank discovers.
If any or all of that is true then I don't begrudge a small business owner the right to check on the authenticity of the currency he/she takes in.
The same in the US even if you get it from the post office. Wear & tear is an accepted long standing tradition in India that relates to the sheer hassle of doing business with 17th century banks..
Quite likely so:). They always gave me the grungy notes. Its actually quite a fun game passing them off to others..
Who do you think they give the fake 500Rs to? The gora's !!!
Yeah, we ate dinner at a niceish restaurant and paid by putting a 500R note in the folder and handing it to the waiter. He comes back a little while later and tries to return a 500R note saying it was ripped. It was NOT the same bill we had given to pay with. BEWARE out there in India Land. No - we didn't let them get away with it. I'd forgotten that little scam.
As for the old "it is the same everywhere" argument on this forum - that is just ridiculous - never sen such paranoia - and yes it is all coming from the banks. however, the torn 10R notes seemed less of a issue in South of India. But when we arrived in the golden triangle and other northen areas every other bill seemed to be refused by rickshaw drivers, hotels, and merchants - it got to the point we just told them to take them or leave them and walk off.
