Grégory had the money ready to buy a car. He was doing some work in his garage. When he returned, he saw how Sally had shredded the money.
He was not angry with Sally: ,,Not at all,’ he tells the Belgian website RTL info. “I blamed myself for the fact that I should have been more careful.”
To stick
At first Grégrory decided to tape the money together, but that was impossible. “It was a real puzzle. I was happy with it all evening. Some notes I was more or less able to salvage, but others were damaged even further. I assumed I wouldn’t be able to use the money anymore.”
He asked his bank for advice and he forwarded him to the National Bank of Belgium, because a procedure at the local bank could take weeks. So he ventured the journey of more than an hour from Liège to Brussels.
Fortunately, he met the conditions to get money back for his torn notes: the damage was involuntary and more than half of the note still existed. “This condition is very important because otherwise the note can be exchanged twice,” said spokesman Geert Sciot of the National Bank to the Belgian website RTL Info.
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crafting yourself
However, a thorough check of the money was still necessary, which took ten days, because Grégory had tinkered with the money himself. “We have to be careful because money exchange is a money laundering technique,” aluds Sciot.
Ten days later the time had come: after his second ride to Brussels, he was allowed to take his money with him. Although he would have preferred to receive his money in cash to avoid a second car trip.
The National Bank says it will continue to work on paper to prevent incidents like this in the future. “We are trying to make our notes stronger and more sustainable. People often think that banknotes are made of paper, but in reality they are made of cotton.”
