# man buys worlds most expensive bottle of beer (sort of) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Tags:** beer\ **Created:** [September 8, 2019, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874 "2019-09-08T05:47:42Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 13\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/1 "2019-09-08T05:47:42Z")
this is why ya always check your receipt at the bar [MSN](https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/news/an-australian-sports-journalist-was-accidentally-charged-dollar100000-for-a-bottle-of-beer-during-a-work-trip-to-england-and-he-wont-get-his-money-back-for-over-a-week/ar-AAGTvIK) My question is if hed been pissed drunk and the barmaid didn’t catch it … and he woke up the next day and tried t0 get it switched back what would have happened? I mean the could bar owner have said "sorry bloke but all sales are final " tho i dont know why it taking 9 days for him to get it back is an issue …its usually 7-14 here in the us ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 6:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/2 "2019-09-08T06:09:26Z")
This guy has $100,000 of available credit on his credit card? Or he keeps more than $100,000 in his checking account? Sports journalism must be more lucrative than I would have thought. ---
**Author:** ![nightshadea](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/7ba0ec/32.png) [@nightshadea](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nightshadea)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/3 "2019-09-08T06:20:41Z")
you’d of thought a fraud alert/lock would be going on … I mean i spent 200$ in LA once and my bank froze my card because at the time id never used it more than 20 miles from my house I had to call to get it unlocked … ---
**Author:** ![guizot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guizot/32/3636_2.png) [@guizot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/guizot)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 12:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/4 "2019-09-08T12:59:23Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > This guy has $100,000 of available credit on his credit card? Or he keeps more than $100,000 in his checking account? Sports journalism must be more lucrative than I would have thought. My thoughts exactly. And because it seems to have been a foreign bank transaction, wouldn’t this have raised flags in the system? It sure would be a convenient and relaxing way to launder money. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/5 "2019-09-08T13:50:26Z")
> [@guizot](#): > > My thoughts exactly. And because it seems to have been a foreign bank transaction, wouldn’t this have raised flags in the system? It sure would be a convenient and relaxing way to launder money. Yeah, this story just doesn’t really add up for me. ---
**Author:** ![DorkVader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/73ab20/32.png) [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 3:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/6 "2019-09-08T15:23:30Z")
I can’t speak about the nations involved in the story, but in the US that transaction would have been denied and investigated right away. IIRC the largest amount of money you can transfer without having to explain to the Fed and the federales as well is $10,000, or at least that is what I remember the reporting threshold as being, where the financial institution is required by law to report the transaction. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [September 8, 2019, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/7 "2019-09-08T18:18:29Z")
> [@Colibri](#): > > This guy has $100,000 of available credit on his credit card? Or he keeps more than $100,000 in his checking account? Sports journalism must be more lucrative than I would have thought. He was on business, possibly he was allowed to use a work card and it has a high limit? > [@DorkVader](#): > > I can’t speak about the nations involved in the story, but in the US that transaction would have been denied and investigated right away. IIRC the largest amount of money you can transfer without having to explain to the Fed and the federales as well is $10,000, or at least that is what I remember the reporting threshold as being, where the financial institution is required by law to report the transaction. Not true, the CTR requirements are only for pure cash transactions at banks. And you don’t really have to “explain” much. ---
**Author:** ![DorkVader](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/73ab20/32.png) [@DorkVader](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DorkVader)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2019, 6:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/8 "2019-09-09T06:50:35Z")
I won’t argue, it’s been several years since I had any interest in international money transfers, so no surprise that my recall of the legalities is faulty. All the same, I have trouble beleiving a transaction of that size not being flagged and stopped for further examination and confirmation ---
**Author:** ![Billdo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/billdo/32/315_2.png) [@Billdo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Billdo)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2019, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/9 "2019-09-09T14:07:00Z")
Unrelatedly, I was recently shopping with my daughter for a three ring binder for school as Staples. When it was scanned at the checkout, the price that came up was $9,999.99. It was obviously a pricing error, and the store corrected the price to the proper five bucks or so that it actually cost. However, if the cashier and I were distracted, I could have easily put the full charge onto my card, which would have been a total mess to correct. It’s a running joke that my daughter has her $10,000 binder at school ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2019, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/10 "2019-09-09T14:14:52Z")
At the other end of the spectrum, I once had someone pay cash for a $250 purchase. He then found one additional $6.00 item he also wanted, but had spent all of his cash. He offered his credit card and it was declined. He laughed. He knew he was close to his limit, but didn’t realize just how close. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2019, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/11 "2019-09-09T14:48:41Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > Not true, the CTR requirements are only for pure cash transactions at banks. And you don’t really have to “explain” much. While true, thanks to Federal regulations banks in the US have to keep an eye on credit transactions as well, and not just multi-thousand dollar transactions either. I worked for a credit card processor which is the link between the business and the credit card association (Visa, MC) which in turn was the link to the card holder’s bank. Take, say, a convenience store (without fuel pumps) where your typical credit or debit transaction was less than $25. If it suddenly started processing a string of $200 transactions that would trigger another department’s looking into why; it could be they’d started laundering money. I worked as a CSR, helping the merchant, and if I noticed transactions out of whack with what was expected but did not report it, I had some 'splaining to do when it was noticed and my fingerprints were on the account. Needless to say, we were not to tell the merchant suspicion had been raised. This was not a frequent occurrence – only a couple times in 11 years – and Australia and Great Britain, of course, have their own rules. ---
**Author:** ![thelurkinghorror](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/7c8e57/32.png) [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)\ **Post date:** [September 9, 2019, 5:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/12 "2019-09-09T17:26:44Z")
> [@DesertDog](#): > > While true, thanks to Federal regulations banks in the US have to keep an eye on credit transactions as well, and not just multi-thousand dollar transactions either. > > I worked for a credit card processor which is the link between the business and the credit card association (Visa, MC) which in turn was the link to the card holder’s bank. Take, say, a convenience store (without fuel pumps) where your typical credit or debit transaction was less than $25. If it suddenly started processing a string of $200 transactions that would trigger another department’s looking into why; it could be they’d started laundering money. I worked as a CSR, helping the merchant, and if I noticed transactions out of whack with what was expected but did not report it, I had some 'splaining to do when it was noticed and my fingerprints were on the account. Needless to say, we were not to tell the merchant suspicion had been raised. > > This was not a frequent occurrence – only a couple times in 11 years – and Australia and Great Britain, of course, have their own rules. That sounds like a fraud prevention thing. Gas pumps also have a limit, something like $75 - which people began to notice during the last gas crisis. You can get more you just need to run your card twice. As others have said, _maybe_ this transaction could have been flagged. But this is a bank-specific procedure, not a federal requirement. We also don’t know his history of transactions, this sort of thing is a balance between detecting legitimate fraud and allowing transactions that are unusual but legitimate. Ideally, the customer would be thankful when a legitimate transaction is declined, but we know it doesn’t work that way, so the potential of a false negative is weighted more heavily than is financially ideal. The $10,000 limit is a result of the Bank Secrecy Act and while it is also designed to detect fraud, it is of a different nature. The former is about a criminal stealing an individual’s account access, but the potential cost to the innocent is limited as the banks usually eat the cost. The CTR is designed for money laundering, racketeering, tax evasion, and other such financial crimes. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [September 10, 2019, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/man-buys-worlds-most-expensive-bottle-of-beer-sort-of/839874/13 "2019-09-10T14:12:07Z")
Nope. As we were neither the card holder’s bank nor the merchant’s bank it was definitely money laundering monitoring imposed by the Feds – the trainings specifically said so. We had no way of monitoring an individual’s card purchases and thus had no info if there was a sudden spate of atypical purchases; that’s on the card holder’s bank’s end. I had my bank call when an attempt to purchase a $5,500 ticket on the Continental Airline site.