MAN RETURNS BAG WITH £2,000 CASH INSIDE AFTER FINDING IT AT TESCO CHECKOUT

Why does this kind of thing never happen to us?  A Tesco shopper was stunned when he emptied his shopping bag at home - and found the carrier stuffed with more than £2,000 in CASH. Kristian Down, 33, had just paid at a self-service checkout when he realised he had left a bag behind. He ran back to grab it - but mistakenly picked up a carrier containing takings from the checkout's till. When he returned home he found £2,197.70 in the bag and a paper receipt. ‘I was so surprised when I got back and saw

this huge wad of money. I didn’t really know what to do and at the time I thought I may have just taken a customer’s bag of cash. ‘Then I found the till receipt and knew it belonged to Tesco. ‘I walked [back] in there and said to a security guard “Are you missing some money?” and he looked at me like I was mad. ‘So I spoke to the duty manager and they didn’t have a clue what I was talking about either. I couldn’t believe it.’ The project manager, who lives in Maryland, Essex, had the unexpected windfall when he visited a Tesco Express in Bournemouth on November 23.

What would you do?

HAND IT BACK - I'M HONEST

Staff had to review CCTV before confirming the money was theirs.

Mr Down, a father-of-one, was given a £50 voucher as a thank you and was later posted another £25 voucher.

‘A lot of people have said to me that 90 per cent of people would have kept the money and I’m surprised it lasted that long on the till without someone else nicking it,’ he said.

‘I was told it would have just gone down as missing money.’

Details emerged at a time when the company is already being investigated for ‘missing’ money.

The Serious Fraud Office is looking into claims it inflated profits by at least £263 million in the first half of this financial year – although there are concerns the practice went on for years.

Mr Down said he was told the ‘pods’ usually used for holding money after cashing up were out of service and a bag was used instead. The member of staff who made the error had been sacked, he added.

A Tesco spokesman claimed senior managers at the store already knew the money was missing when Mr Down returned. He added: ‘Our team have thanked Mr Down and offered him a token of appreciation for returning the money.’