S'porean receives fake RM20 note in Johor Bahru, warns others to be careful

Be careful especially during festive seasons.

Zhangxin Zheng | May 19, 2019, 12:09 PM

Johor Bahru will be filled with Singaporeans this long weekend.

So here's a cautionary story involving counterfeit Malaysian bills.

A Singaporean, Armanizam Dolah, wrote a Facebook post on May 13, 2019, to caution JB goers to be extra mindful during this festive season.

Armanizam shared his experience of receiving a fake RM20 note during his trip to JB recently.

What happened

On May 12, Armanizam and his friends went to visit one of the Ramadan bazaars, Angsana Ramadan bazaar, to immerse in the festive atmosphere in JB.

He bought a drink which costs RM2 at the bazaar, but he did not have any smaller change at that point in time.

He gave the vendor a RM50 note and received some smaller denominations in return.

The change he received included a RM20 note, two RM10 notes, a RM5 note and three RM1 notes.

Armanizam and friends proceeded to do some shopping and also get a haircut at Pasir Pandan.

Fake RM$20 found

Armanizam paid for his haircut, which costs RM25 with the smaller notes he received at the bazaar.

Just as he was about to leave the barber shop, he was stopped by the barber who alerted him that the RM20 note he gave was a fake note.

Here's a photo of the fake RM20 note:

The security thread on the note is actually made of small strips of foil sticker.

The barber showed him a real RM20 note for comparison and he also noticed that the texture of the note felt different too.

The group then quickly checked the authenticity of other notes that night.

While Armanizam initially suspected that he received the fake note at the bazaar, some readers also speculated that the barber could have been the culprit too.

Regardless, he would like to caution people to be mindful when going overseas by sharing this experience.

You can read the full post here:

Top photo collage from Armanizam Dolah's Facebook post