And this check was completely official and legally valid, although it is not clear how the bank employee would have acted if he reported these customers to the counter.
The issue arose when a recipient posted a photo of the check on Twitter with the words “Thank you, but are you sure you can handle this?”
Gareth Hughes received a compensation of 2,324,252,080,110 pounds, transferred over 2.7 trillion euros. For comparison: this is eight times the entire Dutch national budget. British media reported that the Northern PowerGrid energy company in question sent such checks to 74 customers.
swap columns
The reason for the generous compensation was human error: two columns were mixed up in the Excel file of these customers: not the “amount to be paid” on the check, but the identification number of the energy meter.
The energy company told the newspaper that it has now spoken to all 74 customers. They thank them for not trying to collect the money. They will soon get a good check.
