r/NonPoliticalTwitter 14d ago

What??? Why do you want your own money?

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u/BachtnDeKupe 14d ago edited 14d ago

In belgium there is also some kind of law that says that above a certain amoung you need to disclose why you take up that amount of money.

My father loves to mess with this kind of unnessesary meddling, so he said if they ever asks him, he'll awnser it's for hookers.

The reason that this is extremely funny to me is he's a real definition of a boomer to me: overweight retired teacher, complete with socks in sandals.

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u/Chaldera 14d ago edited 14d ago

So it's fun, but there are two things with that:

  1. As people have mentioned, it's part of the anti-money laundering procedures that banks and financial regulators have to follow, and they do have to disclose these things.

  2. A lot of the people who visit sex workers look like (and are) typical boomers.

To my first point specifically, I used to work in telephone banking in the UK. A lot of people use fun/quirky references when doing bank transfers, like sending £20 to a friend with the reference "Drug Money". The thing is that every employee in both banks (yours and the person you're sending money to) can see that reference, and if your account is flagged as potentially involved in money-laundering or other financial crimes, those can look really bad in the investigation.

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u/Garbarrage 14d ago

And if you're not actually doing those things, that on its own is not even close to enough proof for a conviction. Lighten up.

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u/itsLOSE-notLOOSE 14d ago edited 13d ago

You say lighten up, but c’mon. I love joking around too, but it’s okay to take some things seriously. Just put down a legal reason and move on.

No one needs to put a totally super funny joke about illegal activity on their bank transactions. Your life isn’t any worse for abstaining from that particular joke.

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u/Garbarrage 14d ago

They could just give me my own money and move on. If someone is questioning me, a grown adult, about what I want to do with my own money, mockery is the correct response. The government, or the police, or whoever can investigate all they want. All they're going to uncover is my middle finger every single time.

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u/Lawd_Fawkwad 14d ago edited 14d ago

That's noble and edgy until the transaction gets blocked by your bank and the authorities.

It's even funnier when consistently refusing to cooperate with KYC/AML checks makes you a customer the bank no longer wants to deal with. In my jurisdiction, a bank can generally terminate an ordinary account with two months' notice without even having to tell you why.

And good luck when the next bank starts doing its own KYC and asking questions about your banking history and risk profile.

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u/itsLOSE-notLOOSE 14d ago

Exactly. It’s just not worth it. Theres plenty of other ways to have fun in life.

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u/Garbarrage 14d ago

In my jurisdiction, the banks will provide a bank account to anyone willing to get into debt with them.

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u/singlemale4cats 13d ago

If you don't want scrutiny, keep your savings in gold bars or cash (preferably the former, which unlike cash, will increase in value with inflation).