Isn't that illegal?

[cashierbex]

The tip jar post reminded me of something that happened a year ago.

We had a coin machine for a long time. One of the few places where I live that had one. But alas, since our 'remodel', they took it down. Miss that thing greatly.

Some guy buys some stuff. Pays in cash. Only gets the coins back, but left before it even came out (people just don't care). I take the change and put it in our donation cup. The next customer (she always gives me problems about my "service") gets all pissy:
SC- Isn't that illegal?
Me- No, people forget their change all the time.
SC- I think it's illegal
Me- to myself *you know, theres a cop right behind you* (guy was not in uniform, but I recognized him from my Judo class long ago. . He mostly did undercover work, like check seeing if we ID people.)

Her friend comes up and starts talking about it with her, with her friend agreeing its illegal, while leaving the store.

Now, I can understand if I pocketed the money, especially when I am not a tipped employee. That would get me into big trouble. But the guy was not gonna come back, there is no where else for me to put the change unless I did a "MISC INCOME" thing, but I rather give the 70 cents to charity (it adds up nicely after a while).

[Argabarga]

Unless you're Congress, your opinion on the legality or illegality of something doesn't matter, and neither does a consensus opinion amongst your friends. You can find 5,000 people who swear up and down that it's illegal for the IRS to collect on taxes from them, doesn't make them correct.

[Merriweather]

So what the heck did she expect you to do with it? If there's no automatic cash thing, and a customer walks off without all their change (or is accidentally shortchanged) the money would end up back in the register until/unless the customer came back & complained - which they aren't going to on a few cents change. So she'd rather see the company make a bit more money at the end of the day rather than have it go to a charity?

Too bad you couldn't get away with saying "well, I have to take it out, can't leave it there for the next customer like you to take".

[EyeAgree]

We had a coin machine for a long time.
Some guy buys some stuff. Pays in cash. Only gets the coins back, but left before it even came out (people just don't care). I take the change and put it in our donation cup. The next customer (she always gives me problems about my "service") gets all pissy:

You held your tongue better than me. I would have been tempted to say, haven't you ever heard of Finders Keepers, Loosers Weepers?
I think she was just annoyed that she didn't find the change before you did.
But to answer the original question, I've never heard of any law against what you did, not would it make sense if there was one.

[flybye023]

I'm with Merriweather--what did she expect you to do with it? At my store, we put left-behind change in an envelope with the date and the register number then sent it to the back. If after 30 days no-one had claimed it, it was sent to the bank with our daily deposit as Misc. deposit.

On the other hand, we had a growing pile of foreign coins that we couldn't do anything with. We weren't allowed to take it home, we weren't allowed to throw it away, and we couldn't send it to the bank because they would charge us more than the coins were worth to change it to U.S. currency

[Shalom]

we had a growing pile of foreign coins that we couldn't do anything with. We weren't allowed to take it home, we weren't allowed to throw it away, and we couldn't send it to the bank because they would charge us more than the coins were worth to change it to U.S. currency

There's more than one way to convert foreign coins to US currency.

Put up a basket with a sign. "Exotic Foreign Coins! Your choice, just 25c each"

[lvceline]

I love when people claim something is "illegal" but then have absolutely no more knowledge to back it up with.

[AccountingDrone]

I love when people claim something is "illegal" but then have absolutely no more knowledge to back it up with.

Back when I was taking contract law [paralegal not lawyer version] our teacher did a 4 hour class that was more or less peoples misconceptions about contracts and contract law. Fascinating! She pointed out that most people rarely actually read the contracts they were signing so they had literally no idea what they were signing. Some of the examples were absolutely appalling. I think the best example is enlisting in the military - the signee basically signs away their constitutional rights for the time they are in, and it includes the rights of their dependents as long as they are living in military housing or are physically present on a military installation. [of course being a military brat, and long time dependent, I already knew this - I used to joke that the power of attorney that hubby signed gave me the right to sell him into slavery - the way it was worded I could reenlist him for another 6 year hitch if I wanted to]

[evilhomer]

I love when people claim something is "illegal" but then have absolutely no more knowledge to back it up with.

Ignorance is a virus that some people are just determined to spread and infect the whole world.


Having said that, here's my uninformed, ignorant take on it. It is the person's responsibility to make sure they have the correct change before leaving the cashier. Once they walk away, the transaction has been accepted as correct, otherwise, people could just come back anytime later claiming to be shortchanged. As for the money, it has to go somewhere, charity certainly seems like the best place for it.

[Jay 2K Winger]

As for the money, it has to go somewhere, charity certainly seems like the best place for it.

Personally, I think the best place for it would be my pocket.

But that, they tell me, is illegal at worst, immoral at worst, so I suppose putting it with charity is a valid option.

Fools! When I take over the world, that will be one of the first things I institute! All change left behind will go into my pocket! BWAHAHAHAHA-- *koff* I mean, LOOK A THREE-HEADED MONKEY! *flees*

[RealUnimportant]

Having said that, here's my uninformed, ignorant take on it. It is the person's responsibility to make sure they have the correct change before leaving the cashier. Once they walk away, the transaction has been accepted as correct, otherwise, people could just come back anytime later claiming to be shortchanged.

I have to explain this so often it's not even funny, especially in relation to our machines - if you have a problem come see a member of staff ASAP, not 3 days later. Once you've left the area, you're considered to have accepted the purchase as being correct, and any possible adjustment will probably require additional payment unless we can establish that it really wasn't your fault AND it's something we have the power to authorise - which is a very tiny number of things.