CF tipped guide in obsolete notes

[FloraPostIt]

I recently went on a group tour. I was a single traveller with a group of other single travellers from various countries and an amazing local guide. It was two weeks. The guide's income has been massively hit by COVID and he has a young family so tips at the end of the tour are a massive deal for him.

On the last night one of the group had collected tips from everyone - about £50 in local currency each - and gave a little speech. We all applauded and thanked him.

Shortly after going to bed I got a WhatsApp message from the guide with a photo of some UK notes asking if they were valid. I was the only UK traveller.

I knew exactly who had put them in. On the first day a woman from the US had tried to exchange about £100 in £10 notes but couldn't as they were the old paper ones. She asked me to buy them off her and bring them back to the UK. I said I'd need to think about it - I'd only just met her, wasn't 100% I could change them and live nowhere near a bank anyway. I heard no more. But she knew they were worthless in that country.

By the time I got the message from the guide, she had already left for the airport as she was the first to go.

I met the guide next morning and he was upset and begging me to help. I agreed to bring the notes back, try to change them and transfer the money. I explained it would likely be a few weeks. It has been less than a week and I'm getting pleading messages urging me not to forget and I'm feeling terrible. I will most likely go into the city tomorrow to try and deal, which is a huge faff.

I spoke to the woman who took the collection and she was fuming and had no idea. She is much more assertive than me and sent CF a message who replied with a link saying the notes were valid as they could be taken to a bank in the UK. Assertive woman pointed out that Guide had never been to Europe in his life.

I kind of want to message CF and make this her problem, not mine, as I'm feeling guilty and stewing. However I'm rubbish at confrontation and am worried this would make md feel worse. I'm afraid I'm a very un-Munsnetty drip. WIBU to message CF? Any advice?

I also feel that if she was going to palm off her useless notes she could at least have put all £100 in but she only put in half.

You can go to the Bank of England and change out of date notes - I've done it myself. There is some times a queue.

Wouldn't it have been easier for you to have given the guide the equivalent local currency at the time, rather than going through the palaver of taking notes back, getting them changed and then transferring?

@MatildaTheCat

Is CF on FB? You could post on her wall that she’s made a ‘mistake’ and left the guide in a difficult situation. Unfortunately that’s the only thing I can think of to shame her and frankly she sounds pretty shameless.

These people are pretty shameless...

My guess if you did this... She'd do a self justifying post saying...

"Hey it was a hundred dollars - the equivalent of x days work in that country... all he had to do was go to a bank... Easy!"....

All her contacts will think she's this very generous person...

Few will realise the distress and hurtnto the guide.... And utter hassle for you...

As if course all Europeans live a 100m from a bank don't they

if she didn't swap the entire collection for her out of date notes then I would just leave it.

If I understand correctly she ''tipped'' with notes that are no longer accepted. She's a tightwad. But not your circus not your monkeys.

Perhaps I'm being overly suspicious, but are you absolutely sure this isn't a scam? Poor tour guide gets given useless notes by mean tourist, asks nice tourist for help, nice tourist sends money after being pressured to do it asap, doesn't realise til later that old notes are not only old but also fake.

Be careful OP.

All asking why I didn't give him local currency, I left in the very early hours of the following morning and the guide met me at the taxi to give me the money. I had no local currency left. I shared a taxi with the woman who did the collection and we both agreed in hindsight that we'd have gone to the ATM if we'd thought of it but it was early and we were both tired, annoyed and not thinking straight. This would indeed have solved a lot of problems, if only my flight had been a few hours later!

I thought you had to take old notes to the Bank of England now that they're not in circulation?

[quote FloraPostIt]@Seeline just hers. She was apparently very furtive when she put them in there.[/quote]
So the local guide got local tip from everybody else, he only got out of date notes from ONE person.

I can see why he's pressuring you because if this woman put in 50 stg then after you've sorted it all out for him, and put it in to his account for him, that's the value of everybody else's tips put together.

The American woman was very lazy, but her ''tip'' was still worth everybody else's tips put together by the sound of it.

No wonder guide doesn't want you to forget!

I would go along with it now as you said you would but she's not that big of a cheeky fucker. She knows that you can sort it out. You are doing so. It was a bigger tip than everybody else's but together. So from her point of view she won't see herself as a cheeky fucker.

@Reusablebags

I woman leaving the notes has certainly been a dick. But irrespective it seems you committed to changing the notes and you should now do it. I don’t think it’s very decent of you to be complaining about “pleading” messages and trying to pass it on to someone else etc. You were provided with an excellent service by your account and it sounds like there’s a difference in standard of living and much likely the loss/delay of this money to the guide and his young family is greater than the “faff” to you of going into town. The point to refuse to deal with the issue was before you were passed the money. Now you’ve committed to it, deal with it promptly and gracefully (and tbh be grateful you’re not in a position to have to rely on tips and send pleading messages for your own money).

This

Yes the woman is a cf but I sounds like the guide still got a really decent tip, £50 from each of you? Depending on the size of the group that's a lot tbh and I think the guide is rather cheeky putting this all on you actually. If I were him I'd exchange the (bonus) money for whatever I could and be thankful that I'd still had a really decent tip from the rest of you. This is a lot of drama!

Money laundering is about concealing funds that are the proceeds of crime. It's not at all about £50 of obsolete notes.

@TheVolturi

Yes the woman is a cf but I sounds like the guide still got a really decent tip, £50 from each of you? Depending on the size of the group that's a lot tbh and I think the guide is rather cheeky putting this all on you actually. If I were him I'd exchange the (bonus) money for whatever I could and be thankful that I'd still had a really decent tip from the rest of you. This is a lot of drama!

You don't know how much that tip is relative to what he gets paid though, not every country has a minimum wage, I've been on tours like this and the guides work around the clock for days or even weeks, they're basically on call to smooth out any issues. They work pretty damn hard for that tip!

I understand that violet, it could be a lot of money to him yes. But he still got however many times that amount from each and every other person so he got a good tip. It's not for op to have to take on all of this stress.

When it comes to transferring the money to the guide, I'd 100% recommend using Wise (formerly called Transferwise) or a similar service like Revolut. Their transfer fees are lower than what most normal banks charge (often significantly lower), and it is often quicker too.

I have only used it to transfer money within Europe or to North America, but I think it should work all over the world if you have the person's bank details.

There's loads of old notes knocking around the Forex system. Forex desks will often take them and either give them to the next punter or (correct procedure) there's a protocol to follow to declare the notes destroyed/removed from circulation and they get credited back in local currency

Jeez you are so over thinking this.
CF did a shit thing.
You are helping out the guide - (who you like and think is a nice person, and presumably has a much lower standard of living than you) a small favour by going to a bank/posting the old notes and exchanging the money, all of which is legit.
The time you've spent on this thread this little admin job would have been finished!
How do you get anything done in life?!?
Why do you begrudge doing such a small favour to a fellow human being who needs your help? They were unlucky there wasn't another Brit on the holiday - you are obviously not a kind person.

What are you talking about !

Was OP over thinking the initial problem , no she is asking for opinions and advice
Spending all this time on a thread ? OP posted at 8.30 this morning and had it sorted out in his /her head what they were going to do about it at 9.20 .

The little life admin job , I and I suspect others have never tried to change old notes at a bank , and even if I did my nearest bank is a 20 min bus ride and 15 min walk away so getting opinions on here would be worth while for me too.

How does OP get anything done in life ? quite well I suspect.

Op doesn't begrudge doing this favour for the tour guide , s/he begrudges the CF who fobbed of the poor guide with duff money .

@FloraPostIt is a nice person s/he is going to sort it out as soon as s/he can , what more do you want them to do

@TheVolturi the pleading messages are what's setting off my scam alarm. It's textbook pressurising used by scam / con-artists. He was tipped a lot of money by a number of people, and whilst if this is legitimate he would certainly want the money (and rightly so, it's his money), it seems illogical that he needs it so desperately given that he's just been given a lot of cash very recently. No need for the emotive pressuring tactics at this stage.

OP I would verify the notes and get the money from the bank before you send anything to him. Please just be careful and don't be pressured.

For posters saying he got a good tip - when you book with guides, it's made clear how much you are expected to pay/tip them at the end. They count it as part of their salary and the group know from the beginning to factor it into their expenses. It's not as though they lost 'extra' money. It's as though your pay-packet turned up £50 down. Of course, you'd try to get it fixed.

Those suggesting you could have replaced CF's with local currency at the time. That's ok, as long as the transaction with the bank goes smoothly. If it doesn't/didn't you would be out for the entire hundred quid that CF put in the hat. I'm assuming it will be ok, but... You have done a good thing in offering to sort it out. I don't think putting yourself at the risk of being a hundred quid down, for the sake of a week or whatever of bank fandanglings, is your responsibility, morally or otherwise.

[quote Lockheart]@TheVolturi the pleading messages are what's setting off my scam alarm. It's textbook pressurising used by scam / con-artists. He was tipped a lot of money by a number of people, and whilst if this is legitimate he would certainly want the money (and rightly so, it's his money), it seems illogical that he needs it so desperately given that he's just been given a lot of cash very recently. No need for the emotive pressuring tactics at this stage.

OP I would verify the notes and get the money from the bank before you send anything to him. Please just be careful and don't be pressured.[/quote]
I must admit that though I did not think of it quite this way it did occur to me that OP may get msgs in the future asking for money .

@DingDongDenny

If you can afford to I would just send him the money now before changing the notes. You do risk a loss, but he sounds desperate, with a family to support

Exactly this. Then mail them in and wait for your replacement. No need for the drama!

@RatInADollhouse this is exactly how scammers work.

OP should not send anything until she has the cash in her possession.

As long as the transaction goes smoothly. Don't put yourself at risk. Or potential risk of being financially vulnerable. As per my post above.

Why not then just transfer the money to him now and sort it out at your leisure?

It would take the pressure you both you and him. It’s awful that he feels he has to send you increasingly desperate messages.

I appreciate this isn’t your fault - but you made a commitment flying resolve it. I would arrange the money transfer first and then sort it out.

As others have said send a very passive aggressive message to the American lady explaining how upset the guide was, but that you stepped up and resolved it on her behalf.

This was clealry money she had lying around for years - what a selfish woman

Why not then just transfer the money to him now and sort it out at your leisure?

Obviously, because if there's an issue with the notes the US woman has given the OP, the OP is out of pocket.