TALLINN - Estonians swarmed the offices of major banks on Jan. 30, checking whether the 100 kroon bills in their wallets were part of the thousands reported as defective, the daily Eesti Paevaleht reported.
On Jan. 28, the Bank of Estonia announced that up to 6,000 defective 100 kroon banknotes, printed in 1999 by the German Bundesdruckerei, may be in circulation. When the banks opened for business on Jan. 30, citizens were already lined up at the door.
People visited the offices of Hansabank, according to reports, and a few of them did indeed have defective bills. The bank notes were immediately removed from circulation.
Spokesman for the Bank of Estonia, Janno Toots, said banknotes could be checked in the offices of commercial banks. The central bank does not carry out the procedure, but advises the public on what action to take.
"Even if a defective bill is detected in the course of a check, no sanctions will follow," Toots told Eesti Paevaleht.
"The chief checking procedure is carried out by the producer. According to the agreement, the producer is responsible for the quality of cash money," he added.
Two weeks ago, the Bank of Estonia received a confirmation of the mistake from the German printer, although the problem had emerged as early as last fall.
The bank informed police after becoming aware of the problem in October 2005, while the public remained in the dark. Even before then, the bank had received police reports about suspect bills, but they were not officially verified.
Ten people have so far been detained due to the defective bills, and all were accused of criminal action.
The governor of the central bank, Andres Lipstok, said the bank kept mum so as not to cause panic. "We judged that there was no reason to create such confusion and we seem to have been right. There have been no further incidents. The 10 cases are the only ones that have taken place," he told the public broadcaster ETV on Jan. 27.
The supervisory council of the Bank of Estonia plans to discuss the bank's action at the end of February.
The head of the supervisory body, Mart Sorg, said the central bank did not act correctly when keeping the affair secret. He added that, if he had been informed about the defective bills sooner, he would have recommended making the information public.
The council will address the matter at its regular meeting on Feb. 21, Sorg said, adding that he saw no need to call an emergency meeting as the incident had already happened.
