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Pet owners would know that keeping a pet can get expensive.

They might even have remarked, every once in a while, "I feel like my pet is eating my money."

A hamster owner in Singapore may well have blurted out such a line, when their hamster escaped from its home and went right for an unattended S$50 note that it found, leaving it in a tattered state:

The owner then sought advice via Facebook, on the Singapore Syrian Hamster Group, attaching photos of the aftermath, and of the tiny guilty party, who appeared to have been caught and returned to its enclosure.

The post drew remarks that the hamster had "expensive taste".

It is possible, however, that the hamster had passed up on notes of lower denomination, given that S$10, S$5, and S$2 are typically made out of plastic, rather than paper.

Advice from commenters

Commenters then advised the owner on various options to deal with the situation:

Can the note be exchanged?

A common line of advice was to bring the shredded note to the bank and reclaim its value.

According to the Currency Act, recovering the value of mutilated currency is not an entitlement.

However, the value "may be refunded as an act of grace" at the "absolute discretion" of the authorities.

"No face then no value"

However, the owner came back to her Facebook post with unfortunate news: a bank officer had rejected the note.

Some comments suggested the owner try and recover the part of the note that had been torn off:

Which apparently went quite successfully.

"I'm going to bank again 🤣 🤣 🤣 " wrote the owner.

You can see the full post (and possibly updates on the status of the S$50 note) here: