Finnish duo sentenced for elaborate receipt fraud scheme
Two thirty-year-olds from Finland were sentenced to four months' suspended prison time for defrauding grocery stores using forged deposit receipts.
Finnish police detained the men who, for about two months, used counterfeit slips to defraud stores of over €3,000 (approximately £2,600).
According to the newspaper "Iltalehti," the fraudsters exchanged fake receipts for cash dozens of times in the supermarkets of the largest Jumbo shopping centre in Vantaa, near Helsinki. The maximum value of a single refund was over €130 (approximately £110).
The fake slips were so well-made that cashiers couldn't detect the fraud. The police described them as "professionally" crafted. This allowed the men to defraud money without hindrance for an extended period.
Caught in the act
The fraudsters were caught in the act, and additional forged receipts were found in their car. Furthermore, one of the men had a laptop with professional graphic software installed and a portable receipt roll printer. The court did not believe his claims that the computer did not belong to him, especially since it was logged into his unique personal account.
The court sentenced the men to four months' suspended prison time and obligated them to cover the merchants' losses. The state also decided to confiscate the computer. The district court's verdict became final after an appeal was rejected by a higher court.
The deposit system has been in place for years in Finland
According to the Polish Press Agency, Finland has been using a container deposit system for over 70 years. This system was introduced during the Olympic Games in Helsinki in 1952, initially covering glass bottles. In the 1980s, it was extended to plastic bottles and in the 1990s to aluminium cans.
Currently, Finland, with a population of about 5.5 million, boasts one of the highest packaging recycling rates in the world: around 95% of cans, 90% of plastic bottles, and 87% of glass bottles are returned and recycled.
About 4,000 reverse vending machines operate in the country, mainly in grocery stores. Deposits range from 10 euro cents (about 9 pence) for a small can to 40 euro cents (about 35 pence) for a large plastic bottle. After returning the containers, the machine prints a receipt to be presented at the store's checkout.
