Taking found change from the automatic checkout

[displacedinMN]

If it is small. Mine.....But I rarely use cash.

[srvy]

Pirate booty. I seem to always find money on top the hand car wash. I can say that i've ever looked in the self checkout. Id be willing to bet at Walmart if cash isnt taken in a set time it retracts back inside.

[TwistedChief]

People have compared my job to picking up pennies in front of a bulldozer, so I make a point of picking up coins found on the street (exceptions are subway platforms and restrooms).

But when it comes to change that’s left on the counter at a store, I’m ambivalent. I end up leaving it hoping that it ends up with someone who needs it just a bit more.

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by TwistedChief

People have compared my job to picking up pennies in front of a bulldozer, so I make a point of picking up coins found on the street (exceptions are subway platforms and restrooms).

But when it comes to change that’s left on the counter at a store, I’m ambivalent. I end up leaving it hoping that it ends up with someone who needs it just a bit more.

This poses a very interesting ethical question. If the found money is to be used for social equity, then theoretically a person with above median income (or wealth) should leave the change because there's a probability of more than 50 percent that the next person will need it more. Meanwhile, a person with below median income should take it, because the odds are less than 50 percent that the next person will need it more.

But it's more complex than that. If everyone is following the rules, then the person with an income in the 49th percentile will know that a higher-income person arriving next will NOT take it. So therefore, if the 49th percentile person leaves the change untouched, there's a 100 percent chance that the person who does take it will have greater need. So they should leave it.

Then the same becomes true for a person in the 48th percentile, then the 47th, and so on. In a perfect theoretical world, the change then remains in place until eventually the lowest-income person in the area comes to buy something, and then that person can rightfully take it.

But will they know that they're eligible? Probably not. So then they follow the same rules and nobody claims the money. Eventually, the change slot overflows, and customers have to pick their way through ever-growing mounds of change to even reach the self-checkout. I'm not sure what the endgame is.

[SAUTO]

Originally Posted by TwistedChief

People have compared my job to picking up pennies in front of a bulldozer, so I make a point of picking up coins found on the street (exceptions are subway platforms and restrooms).

But when it comes to change that’s left on the counter at a store, I’m ambivalent. I end up leaving it hoping that it ends up with someone who needs it just a bit more.

Would that be commodity speculation?

[Simply Red]

daru write-in for my vote -

'quick strike profit made'

[TLO]

Wal-Mart's auto checkout gave me back $300 on a $65 purchace one time. I turned it i customer service. Lady said there were hundreds mixed in with the $10's.

[Nickhead]

Originally Posted by TLO

Wal-Mart's auto checkout gave me back $300 on a $65 purchace one time. I turned it i customer service. Lady said there were hundreds mixed in with the $10's.

And this is why America needs different sized bills. Here down under the bills are just that and different colours. Too much wiggle room for those type of mistakes

[Frazod]

I leave it. I'm hopelessly honest. Dammit.

[DaFace]

I bet I haven't paid cash at a grocery store for over a decade.

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by displacedinMN

If it is small. Mine.....But I rarely use cash.

Originally Posted by DaFace

I bet I haven't paid cash at a grocery store for over a decade.

I never pay cash either, but the change slot is near the credit card slot and it's mere inches from where I'm scanning. Since it's a self-checkout, the change is obviously abandoned if it's sitting there, so I'll "rescue" it if it's a small amount.

[cabletech94]

rain man, you monster!

[Rain Man]

Originally Posted by cabletech94

rain man, you monster!

When I get enough, I plan to use it to build an orphanage in Malawi. I forgot to mention that.

(Or buy barbecue. The plans aren't finalized yet.)

[Hog's Gone Fishin]

On a side note. I found a wallet laying in the middle of an intersection last week. It was loaded with money. I don't know how much but it had $50 bills in it. I took it by the address on the drivers license but nobody was home so I dropped it off at the police station. Two days later the daughter of the owner of the wallet called me to thank me and offered a reward. I refused the reward and told her that knowing the owner got his stuff back was reward enough.

That being said , leaving change for someone else to pocket is just dumb.

[cooper barrett]

This is going to sound like a fish story but... in the summer of 2003.

I had laid a leather portfolio on the roof of my truck (105 and Medcalf) when I took a phone call (I left it there like a dumb ****) and when I turned left going south, onto Antioch from 103rd st,, it slid off the roof, I heard something but over engine noise and radio, I thought nothing of it. When I reached my Atty's office (College and Antioch) I reached for it and suddenly that noise I heard made total sense. I flew down there as I had about $6K in cash, don't ask, in a zippered pocket. When I got there NADA, ****ing NADA!

I get in the truck. pounding the dash and steering wheel and head for the atty's kicking myself for losing $6K without anything to show for it.

I get to the atty, I tell him what just happened and he suggested a call to the cops was in order and looked at me funny (like WTF are you doing with $6K in cash) and that an ad in a local newspaper would be senseless.

My phone rings and a guy tells me that he was behind me and saw it come off my truck, stopped, and grabbed it up. He called the store as he saw the receipt in the mesh pocket, and they gave him my cell #. I asked the guy if he could bring it to me, or I could meet him and he said he was headed home in a bit and that he had plans with the family and could meet me afterwards. I found out where he was, where he was going and arranged for my GF to meet him on their ways home, The stars aligned on this one as she was on his route home
She called me when she got there, I told her to open the zippered pocket and if there are lots of $100 dollar bills in there, there was, to give him $400 and thank him for doing the right thing and walk away, no taking it back.

I looked at my attorney who had stepped out momentarily and gave him the thumbs up.

I met the GF at what is now Tanners on College Blvd, she was sitting at the bar, a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue was on the counter, counting the money.

She started in on calling me the stupidest MF, then the luckiest MF, then started sounding like my mother, my accountant. Then we both busted out laughing, bought the bar a round, knocked back a couple more JWB's and as we left, I asked her what she thought about exchanging sex for money. Then the negotiations began.

I now use binder clips and produce bands for cash.

That bing said, I never find cash but I bought brats and hanging out of the coupon printer was a $5 off brats coupon. I snatched it up.

Originally Posted by Hog's Gone Fishin

On a side note. I found a wallet laying in the middle of an intersection last week. It was loaded with money. I don't know how much but it had $50 bills in it. I took it by the address on the drivers license but nobody was home so I dropped it off at the police station. Two days later the daughter of the owner of the wallet called me to thank me and offered a reward. I refused the reward and told her that knowing the owner got his stuff back was reward enough.

That being said , leaving change for someone else to pocket is just dumb.