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If you found a wallet...

Apple OC said:
Sounds like you could get your ass kicked by a good Samaritan. :cool:
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Right on.

Would you return the wallet, after taking the money? No, you would not, unless you had the balls of an elephant.

I would be happy to get whatever else was in there, like driver's license and various plastic.
 
mobilehaathi said:
So I was talking to an acquaintance recently, and somehow the topic of lost wallets came up. He told me that while he would do everything possible to return a lost wallet, he felt he was entitled to any cash inside and would immediately take it.

Frankly, I was utterly appalled, and I could not believe what I was hearing. Is this a common attitude or is this dude special?
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I agree it is appalling.

I've lost a wallet before, and while it was returned, it was returned minus cash. It was only $40 but back when I lost it (this was awhile ago) that was a lot to me and was almost 1/4 of my weekly paycheck.

I remember finding $200 on the floor in the mall before outside the store I worked at. I had no intention of keeping it but if I did I'm sure I'd of blown it on videogames, but obviously instead I turned it in to mall security since its the right thing to do.

Three months later a surprise car repair was needed and I didn't have the cash for it. That very day mall security stopped by with an envelope saying that no one claimed the $200 and it was mine.

The cost of the surprise car repair? $200.
 
I'd return it intact. If they were out of town, I'd hand it in to the local police.

A friend of mine was returning home from the bar, where his friends had been treating him to birthday drinks. On the way home - a little tipsy - he found a wallet in the snow. Opening it he found a enough money inside to make the decision, um, difficult (though I believe he would have done the right thing). As he riffed through the idea to figure out whose it was - he realized.... it was his own wallet. He had dropped it on the way to the bar, and never noticed its absence since his friends were buying.

He was really happy to get the wallet back with the money.

Where I live someone once posted that they had found $0.87 in the front seat of their car, and if the hitchhiker who dropped it wanted it back they should contact the poster. I guess they felt the hitchhiker needed it more than they did.
 
Bottom of river

I found one when I was a kid by stepping on it in a river. Normally that time of year it was murky water so it was quite by accident. I turned it in to the parks lost and found wet and intact with a couple of dollars and a birth certificate.
 
I have found cellphones, wallets, and cash on the ground (the person walking in front of me dropped it) many times in my life, and each time, I have returned it to the owner or turned it into the authorities.
 
I'd return it. If I couldn't I'd hand it to the police and let them take the money out of it themselves. I mean, let them find the rightful owner.
 
I'd return it, I've even found a wedding ring at a resort, it happened to have the last name engraved (which was a very unique name) so the receptionist was able to return it. The poor lady cried she was so happy to have it back.

Now, "free range" money laying on the ground is free game if no one is around. I think though, that if it was an envlope or substantial amount of money I'd turn it in. That isn't to say I won't leave my name in case no one claims it.

If your co-worker feels that he is entitled to a finders fee, then you had better keep a close eye on your stuff! Some times it can be very tempting working in the hotel industry since you have access to rooms, credit cards numbers, safes, ect ect. It's really important to have honest people working for you.
 
I think most people are good people and would return a found wallet because that is what they would want to happen if they lost it ... however some people are just selfish and couldn't grasp the good feeling of returning it
 
Interesting thing about hotel lost-and-founds is that sometimes they will have a policy to not contact the owner of a lost item. It is usually ridiculously easy to figure out who left an item in a room. And, in my experience, most hotel employees are honest and return the item to the front-desk. People assume that if they haven't been contacted by the hotel about their lost 'thing' that an employee has stolen it.

However... many hotels don't contact the owner because more often than we'd like to admit, the hotel guest doesn't want the other person in the house to know that they were in that hotel... if you catch my drift ;) .

Obviously different hotels have different policies... but you can't assume that the hotel will initiate the contact. Often they just hang on to the object for a few months before it's disposed of somehow.

I've even seen one hotel... a nice fancy one... train the front-desk to screen for spouses who are calling with a vague "I think I may have left something" hoping to confirm a suspicion from a legitimate call about a forgotten item.
 
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If there was a sign of who it belonged to, yeah, I would return it. But if not, I'd probably keep the money.

EDIT: Thumb down away my friends
 
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I'd take the cash but i would return the wallet to the nearest lost and found...VISA's and ID are most likely worth more to the owner then cash. It takes a lot of time to replace ID here in Canada
 
Leet Apple said:
I'd take the cash but i would return the wallet to the nearest lost and found...VISA's and ID are most likely worth more to the owner then cash. It takes a lot of time to replace ID here in Canada
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mobilehaathi said:
True, but how does this entitle you to steal cash?
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I agree....

Canadian cash somehow 'different' that it doesn't matter if you steal it, eh?
 
When I was around 8 years old I found a wallet. Handed it in to my dad and we informed the nearby school (since it was found on the grounds) with a considerable sum inside, no cards or other ID stuff. We spent an hour writing out and handing up posters and all the kids were informed of the discovery and told to tell their parents.

It sat at the school unclaimed for a month. The police were also told but because of the lack of ID they didn't do anything. So I got the money!

That's pretty much what I'd do now; inform nearby buildings, contact police.
 
Leet Apple said:
I'd take the cash but i would return the wallet to the nearest lost and found...VISA's and ID are most likely worth more to the owner then cash. It takes a lot of time to replace ID here in Canada
Click to expand...

not a reflection of Canadian behaviour ... there are always a few bad apples to spoil the bushel
 
obeygiant said:
If some one found my wallet and took the money and gave me back everything else is be happy I wouldn't have to cancel all the card renew my license an replace everything else in there.
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Just because they gave you the cards back doesn't mean they didn't already clone them. Even if I got my wallet back I'd assume identity theft is around the corner, cancel all the cards and sign up for one of those monitoring services to try and keep myself from totally getting screwed.


Lethal
 
chrono1081 said:
I agree it is appalling.

I've lost a wallet before, and while it was returned, it was returned minus cash. It was only $40 but back when I lost it (this was awhile ago) that was a lot to me and was almost 1/4 of my weekly paycheck.

I remember finding $200 on the floor in the mall before outside the store I worked at. I had no intention of keeping it but if I did I'm sure I'd of blown it on videogames, but obviously instead I turned it in to mall security since its the right thing to do.

Three months later a surprise car repair was needed and I didn't have the cash for it. That very day mall security stopped by with an envelope saying that no one claimed the $200 and it was mine.

The cost of the surprise car repair? $200.
Click to expand...


Wow, seems like good karma! I also found about that sum of cash on the beach once with no identification of the owner. So, I asked the lifeguard about returning it and he said I should keep it... I really did want to return it to the owner but at the time I thought it was hard to return money to the rightful owner since people would want to get their hands on the money. So, I kept it. Also, it was because the lifeguard said it wouldn't be safe in the 'lost and found' anyways (if there was one)... Later, I thought about it, if someone really did lose the money he/she will turn up and will be able to name the exact amount that was lost..

If it's a wallet, I wouldn't touch the money. For the people that do take money out of wallet... I can't really judge. I am the kind of person that would return anything that's not "mine" but I might not be in the same financial, education or social situation that brought about that kind of thinking.
 
mobilehaathi said:
So I was talking to an acquaintance recently, and somehow the topic of lost wallets came up. He told me that while he would do everything possible to return a lost wallet, he felt he was entitled to any cash inside and would immediately take it.

Frankly, I was utterly appalled, and I could not believe what I was hearing. Is this a common attitude or is this dude special?
Click to expand...

I'd do the same TBH. At least you're giving the important stuff (cards, ID, etc.) back.
 
I would do everything in my power to get the wallet back to the owner. Same would go for a cellphone/iOS device, purse, etc. I know what its like to lose something, especially something that could potentially ruin the life of that person if it falls into the wrong hands. I wouldn't even know if there was cash in it, as I would only look for contact info of the person. I've been thru this before, when I was a teen I found a purse loaded with cash (open and in plain view) left in a shopping cart of the store I worked at. I wheeled the cart to management and helped find the owner. We found her and she was grateful. That cash was for her daughter's college tuition.

Maybe I'm too generous, I wouldn't expect anything in return other than a "thank you". Thats enough of a "finder's fee" for me.
 
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