Quick-Thinking Shop Owner Thwarts Counterfeit Bill Scam
A shop owner in Chumphon Province spotted counterfeit 1,000-baht notes during a suspicious money-transfer request on July 27, prompting two men to flee on a motorcycle when she refused the fake bills.
Quick-Thinking Shop Owner Thwarts Counterfeit Bill Scam Two teenagers fled on a motorcycle after discovering the bills were fake. On July 28, 2026, reporters met with Orawun, 36, and Parinyakorn, 46, a couple who own a mobile phone shop called Saphli Mobile along the Chumphon-Saphli road in Patiew District, Chumphon Province, after learning they had nearly become victims of a counterfeit currency gang.
Orawun recalled that on July 27 at around 3 p.m., while the shop was open, two young men arrived on a Honda Wave motorcycle with an unknown license plate and asked her to help transfer money into a bank account. The man who spoke had an accent suggesting he was from Tha Sae District.
When she asked for the destination account number, she found it was registered under a woman's name that did not match the man who came with him. However, she was not immediately suspicious, so she asked to receive the cash first before making the transfer. The man then handed her five 1,000-baht notes.
Upon careful inspection of the bills—including checking the watermark and using a counterfeit detection pen—she found there was no royal portrait, the paper thickness was abnormal, and she confirmed that four bills were counterfeit and only one was genuine. She immediately informed both men that the notes were fake.
The man claimed he did not know the bills were counterfeit and said he had received the money from an older contact. However, the shop owner said she would only return the genuine bill and would keep the four counterfeit notes as evidence to file a police report. Both men became alarmed and quickly left the shop, fleeing on their motorcycle.
Orawun noted that she had previously heard of merchants in the market being victimized by criminals using counterfeit 1,000-baht notes to purchase goods. Although this seemed to be a different group, she did not expect it would happen to her own shop. She plans to bring all the counterfeit bills to Patiew Police Station as evidence and asked officers to accelerate their investigation to apprehend and prosecute those responsible.
