To not understand why English businesses won't accept Northern Irish banknotes

[bunsaremybesties]

I am from Northern Ireland, legally a part of the UK that uses sterling. I am currently on holiday in England. In a shop yesterday there were signs displayed saying "we cannot accept Scottish or Irish notes".

My problems with this are:
(a) the use of the phrase Irish notes - personally I don't really have a strong preference for calling myself either British or Irish, but to my ears, "Irish notes", due to the current real-life currencies used on the island of Ireland, would be euro notes, used in the Republic of Ireland. So of course a shop in England would not accept these, just as it would not accept American notes or Mexican notes. I would have thought Northern Irish notes would have been a more accurate description, as Northern Ireland uses the same currency as England.

(b) what is the reasoning for not accepting "Irish"/Northern Irish banknotes, when they're exactly the same currency as those used in England, Wales and Scotland? While in Northern Ireland we do print our own banknotes, we also regularly use and accept banknotes issued in other regions of the UK. I work in a shop and within any hour block at work, I deal with any number of notes from customers that were issued by the Bank of England, Clydesdale Bank, Bank of Scotland etc. The notes have exactly the same value as those issued by Northern Irish banks like Ulster Bank or Danske Bank, so why on earth wouldn't we accept them? It's not even a consideration in our minds to refuse them. Why is it different in England?

(c) if the justification is that Northern Irish notes are not "legal tender" in England, well then everyone who lives in Northern Ireland is in trouble because in Scotland and Northern Ireland no notes, not even ones issued in those countries, are "legal tender". They are, however, legal currency and so are perfectly acceptable to be used for trade.

Can anyone explain please?

It's just ignorance. I don't think there's any cure for it sadly.

Fraud mainly. There have been many attempts with Scottish and Irish fake notes. Whereas with normal English notes there are ways to check

Also they can’t be handed back out as change, (mainly as no one would take them) they have to be physically paid in to a Bank

I don't know about NI notes but Scottish notes are closely associated with drugs/money laundering.

I have no idea. I'm Scottish though and it is a pain in the arse having to make sure we have English bank notes before going anywhere (not as much since covid right enough since we've all gone cashless!)

I was in Sainsbury's last week and a lady was at customer service with the same issue - having her NI cash refused. I waited behind for a while until the lady asked the assistant to serve me whilst they waited for a final answer from elsewhere. I don't know what the outcome was for the lady, but I would have been interested to know.

It’s literally just that most people are morons and don’t understand that sterling is more than Bank of England notes and that NI is part of the UK.
I’ve literally had English people argue with me that NI uses Euros 🤦‍♀️

Total and utter ignorance. It does my fecking head in actually.

Excuse me? Didn't you leave something out of that sentence?

But in NI we use note detector pens and UV light counterfeit detectors, as well as the inbuilt security features in the notes, the same as anywhere else. Couldn't this be done in England too?

And why can't they be handed out as change? In Northern Ireland we hand English banknotes out as change all the time with no issues.

@LittleRebelGirl I imagine they just refused!
I had NI notes more often 10/15 years ago when cash was more commonly used and I was going back and forth a lot and it gave me no end of bother.
I took like £100 to the post office to change the notes so I didn’t have to deal with it and the man tried to tell me I had to go to a bureau de change. I was like first of all pretty sure the post office is also a bureau de change??? Secondly no I don’t because it’s not a foreign currency!!

@Itwasnaeme Like what? I've worked in banks. Deposits of Scottish notes are a red flag. It was one of the red flags that Nat West ignored when they got prosecuted for breaching money laundering laws.

‘Normal English notes’

attitudes like this mostly @bunsaremybesties 🙄

Why would they write that they don’t accept ‘Irish’ notes when the Republic uses Euros ? I think it’s obvious what they mean.

@Tinkerbyebye Whereas with normal English notes there are ways to check

What are you talking about? Of course there are ways to check an NI note! It’s not some dodgy ‘I O U’ written on a page pulled out of a spiral notebook.
The ways to check if a note is counterfeit is the same regardless.

(I should caveat that deposits of Scottish notes in English bank accounts are a red flag. Clearly they're not in Scotland)

Not being confident they can spot fraudulent notes. When I lived in North East England was common to see Scottish notes and were accepted. Not much further down south and refused because the shop couldn’t be sure they would notice fraudulent notes. I expect the same for NI. I don’t think I’ve ever seen one or a long time ago.

And this ignorant response is your answer. Utter ignorance

This was way back in the 90s but I worked in retail in a popular English tourist town. Scottish and NI notes were so rare we didn't know what they were meant to look like (so wouldn't know if they were fake). There was a big event on in the town once that was going to have a lot of visitors from Ireland and NI. The local banks sent out posters with pictures on of the notes to all the shops so everyone could know what they should like (and this was pre-euro so it was also making sure everyone knew not to take Republic of Ireland £s).
But generally the bosses didn't like us taking Scottish/NI notes because of the not knowing what they should look like. Although these days you could just Google what they should look like so I don't know why they aren't always excepted now.

I would assume that most people don't know what a legitimate Scottish or NI banknote looks like so would have no idea if they were being offered a fake.

Truth be told I don't know what security symbols to check on an English note but at least I know roughly what it should look like.

It's the same for both Scottish and Northern Irish banknotes. Although they are legal currency, they are not technically legal tender, so do not have to be accepted.

Depends where you are - eg in northern England close to the border, Scottish notes are readily accepted. Other places, not so much.

I think you can exchange them at banks (you certainly used to be able to)

Because people don't recognise them so don't know that they are genuine. There's only one English £5 note, but there's loads of Northern Irish ones. Your counter above is that they would pass UV pen tests etc. But so would the Northern Bank notes that were withdrawn from circulation after the robbery. All perfect notes, but no longer legal, but the chances of someone on a till in a Coventry Tesco recognising that, are much lower than one in Derry. So it's safer to have a blanket rule.

I worked at Cheltenham races as couple of times and we had pens to check all notes. Also had it at the Oxfam shop when I was a volunteer. I'd never seen NI notes before then - they're v pretty.

Doesn't Michael McIntyre do a routine about this and legal tender?

And English ones aren't?

Never heard such rubbish before.

@Quveas It's a red flag for suspicious activity as this article from crimestoppers states: crimestoppers-uk.org/news-campaigns/campaigns/targeting-money-laundering-in-north-west-england and banks treat it as higher risk than English notes generally.

I'm sure in Northern Ireland we initially didn't know what English or Scottish notes were supposed to look like. But as we used them (if we really wanted to, easily looked them up on the internet!), we soon learnt what they should look like. It just required a little bit of effort so that we could change.