Category: Daily Living
Hey you guys, I was just wondering if you can share any tips on how to identify money. I'm losing more an more sight and now I can't make out the bills. If you can explain any method you use I'd really appreciate it. Thank you.
Scanner-type devices are marketed for this purpose. I purchased mine in 2002 for around $300. I'm sure they've gone down in price at least a bit. Failing in that pursuit...There's always the tried and true method of asking a trusted pair of sight-bearing eyes.
Over here, we have a money detector. Basically you slide the notes in to the device and press a button and it'll give you short vibrating pulses, one for a five, two for a ten, three for a twenty and four for a fifty. They're only available for pounds stirling and euros at the moment, but hopefully that may change in the future. They're cheap in comparrison too. They're around fifteen pounds or something.
I recommend a scanner for the bills, and what sugar said, i've got a note detector and they're very useful, and quite discrete too and, fit in your handbag, purse, etc.
There are talking money identifiers as well as regular scanners. Or, of course, there's the option of having a trusted friend tell you. Once I know what my bills are, I fold them differently. I keep the ones straight, fold the fives in half, fold the tens in half length wise, and fold the twenties in half and then half again. And I also use a wallet with divided pockets so I can keep the bills in separate sections. Between the way I fold them and having the separate sections, it's pretty easy to keep from getting confused.
i didn't know you could get talking money identifiers. where abouts do you get them from?
Thanks for all your informative replies. But I want to ask: would these scanners and such identify thousand dollar bills? I don't have bills of lesser amount in my wallet right now. Oh yeah, and would they detect counterfeit money? Thanks again.
I don't know about detecting counterfeit money, but if you have nothing less than thousand dollar bills, can I be your best friend?
Well, over here, we only go up to fiftys so I can't answer, but in the case of the bank note, as it's called, there's no way it would detect counterfit money as it goes on measurement sensors.
If you put a counterfit bill into a talking bill reader it simply won't read it. I used to work in retail and I used one every day. If it wouldn't read a bill after repeatedly trying it I would mark it with the counterfit pen and quickly get my co-worker's attention in order for them to tell me if it had turned color or not when marked. You can Braille your money, just so you know. If you have one of the big old fassioned Braille Writers, or even a slate and styalis. It's legal in the US, and I am a big fan of it. I occationally would get back a Brailled bill in change at a place where I was a frequent costommer. I always have a trusted sighted person check the bills I get, Brailled or not before I Braille them or trust the Braille all ready on them, but this system works well for me. Also, if you want to be very creative, you can get oragammi books on folding money into interesting shapes, bow ties, cat's heads, butterflies, neck ties, four leaf clovers, etc. It's fun and sighted people really seem to get a kick out of it. Oh, and I like the idea of a note teller that uses descrete pulses instead of auditory identification. I'd been thinking that it should identify money tactily, but aside from a tiny braille display that would be very expensive I hadn't quite worked out how it could be accomplished. I hope they become available in the US soon.
The talking money identifier I know of is alled the Note Teller, and is made in Canada. I know it does US and Canadian Currency. I also fold my money in different ways. Back to the talking identifiers, I haven't found them too reliable. Granted, my experience was a few years ago, and I'm sure they've improved them. If you happen to have a Kurzweil 1000, you can put your bils on the scanner and press shift f9. The manual goes into great detail trying to give you tips as to how to orient the bills, but I ran out of patience trying to understand the details and just tried orienting the bill every way I could think of. . Granted this isn't portable, but I've found it to be extremely reliable. Also, independent living aids sells a little gadjet that you can put in your pocket and braille many of your bills. Sorry, the 1000-dollar ones aren't an option. I try and stack the deck. When get change or cash back, I try and ask for specific bills. Also, When I use the ATM, I ask for multiples of 20. This is another way of "stacking the deck" so I know what I have to start with.
Lou
I also use the folding money method to separate different-amounted bills, and OpenBook has the same ability to read currency, so I use that when I'm at home, or I ask a family member what the bills are. Now that I know it's legal to Braille on money, I'll likely go ahead with buying a labeler that is designed especiallly for that purpose and can use that method as well as the folding one.
I've also heard of the portable money identifiers mentioned in others' posts, but I would personally not want to spend on buying one, unless I was running a business. That's just me though. *smile*
I agree with Tinkerbell in that I don't want to spend the money for a portable identifier. I also figure I carry enough hardware with me. The labeler I mentioned earlier is really portable. You slide the bill into it, and make sure the paper is under the desired amount, that has a label on the outside of the identifier. You squeeze this thingy together, and it punches the braille. I found it hard to read, but I might not have been exerting enough pressure on it.
Lou
wow, it's legal to Braille on money? So I guess that must be an american? I've never heard of that over here.... With regards to LaMusiqueDuSoirTristeEtBelle's comment, abour working in retail, good on ya. Lol, I don't think they'd let us get away with that here. Then again, so few blind people have jobs over here, it's hard to know the answer to that one... I think it's more like a general assumption.
Well, all of our banknotes're different sizes, five being the smallest and fifties, the biggest, so if I have more than one pound note, I'll put two and two together so to speak to compare or feel for the difference in width or length. If I just have the one note I can't identify, a few years ago, I think it was my bank who gave us this plastic note gauge. This is like a plastic card with a large hole in one side so you can see the banknote once it's folded inside it and "steps" cut out of the same half at the top, as it's folded over, so you put your note in this card with the large hole facing upward then count the cut-out "steps" up from the actual top edge of the card (the steps're in the top left-hand corner) so, one step is five, two steps're ten, three steps're twenty and four steps're fifty, but I've never actually seen a £50 note myself. This note gauge is about the same size as a bus pass. I don't know which banks apart from my bank provides these gauges or where else you can get them, but I find it very compact and extremely useful if I couldn't identify which notes're which.
I wish the U.S. would use different sizes of bills. That would be so helpful.
There's a silly site blindollars.org lol but seriously I fold it, and the identifiers are about three hundred plus dollars.
Just to clarify, I never purchased my own note teller. It was provided with my position and it remained with the store's management when I left for college. Yet another reason that I am moving to the UK, paper currency of varying sizes, and banks intelligent enough and creative enough to come up with a simple, and small money identifier in the form of a slotted card.
i didn't know brailling money is legal.
i fold the money differently to identify it always leaving singles loose
I too have one of the little thinggies that you press down onto the money and it brailles out what's on it, Its not the best tu use, but it works enough. The sound of the pulsing thing sounds really nice, then everyone in the hole entire store doesn't have to hear what bill you've got in your hand in the checkout line.
I just fold my money. simple and cheap lol
i am learning about dayliveing at my school
Are you learning to spell and type too? We can only hope.
Now for those of you who want to identify your money, send it to me and I'll identify it for you. LOL
I fold my mony (when I have it in awalett) but sometimes I lose the 20 dollar bill because it's folded up twice. If I have it in my pocket I fold all of it in half and put the larger bills on the outside. So for example the ones then fives and if I have any, tens go on the outside. Sometimes I'm too lazy to fold it in a certain way. lol.
For those of you that can get away with it, I'd recommend using plastic instead of cash. The good thing about credit/debit cards is that you can always dispute credit. So if somebody tries to screw with you, at least this way you have a fighting chance of getting your money back. With cash, there is less traces of the transaction.
Just a thought.
i use the folding method and put it in different sections of my wallet. with singles loose
I have a pound note guide, which I keep in my purse. You use it a bit like those cards that someone else mentioned earlier, where the smallest ridge is a £5, if it goes up to the next one a £10 and the next a £20 note. I also keep the different notes in different parts of my purse, but if I have say a £10 note on its own and no others, it's hard to tell what it is. The people in the bank are quite good and put them in the order I ask them, for example 1 £10 note and 2 £5 notes in that order, so I can fold them up and put them in different parts of my purse.
I just have one of those money wallets that have three or four pockets for money that's already folded differently, and pockets for the change.
I just fold the bills a cirtain way. that way, I know whitch one is whitch
I use a money identifyer. It works great and my friend says the lady sounds hot lol.
It can also be helpful to ask for your change in ones. That way someone cannot give you and one and tell you it is a five.
i just use my scanner to identify dollar bills
I was shown a note detector the other day which works on the number of vibrations it gives out when you hold the button down. My mobility teacher thinks it works by size as how it identifies it. I think you can only get them for £ and euros, but I don't know about US dollars or other currencies. q
I just get people to tell me, and once they done it once I fold them. a one I don't fold, five I do hamburger style, ten It's hotdog style and a twenty it's hot dog and hamburger folds, so it's two folds, so it becomes a fairly small rectangle.
I mostly fold mine as soon as I get thenm and put them in different parts of my purse. I've also got a money brailler which you stamp on a corner of the note once someone's told you what they are. By the way, you can also now get a free program called audibill from Kurzweil. I don't know how to use it very well, but you have to use a screen reader to get round it.
oh i have the braille money marker where i can braille the money from independent living aids and i have my close friend do it for me because she's interested in doing so. i find this method way easier on me than other methods. But i want to try the money identifier but it's too expensive for me now
There's the iBill for $99, which sound slike a really cool device.
definitely planning on asking for one of those for my birthday or Christmas.
I'm surprised people in the U.K. need money identifiers because when I've been traveling there I've been over the moon with the knowledge that I can tell what note is what because of the different sizes. Even after they shrunk them many years ago I still found it really easy. I just tried to make sure that I had a five and, hopefully, a fifty if I needed to compare notes. I found that traveling in the U.K. is really easy when it comes to having to deal with the money. I love your 50P pieces, too. They have different-sized zloty notes in Poland as well, and I always thought that if an emerging-market country like Poland can do this then why not the USA.
you can also get an app for your iPhone/ipod/w/camera or android phones. On android, google goggles can do this and on the IPhone, looktel's money identifier is the solution. If you don't have one of those, the Ibill is definitely the way to go.
I got the money reader for the Iphone. I have no idea where I'd be without it.
Great app, wish I could get it ported to the Android platform. Well, Google goggles is pretty good.
Also it looks like they update google goggles on a regular bases. Sometimes it seems every time I turn around its getting updated.
And the latest version of google goggles seems to be completely accessible, which it wasn't as much so previously.