After Dog Ate Their Money, Treasury Dept. Reimburses Couple

By Aditi Mukherji, JD on October 03, 2013 | Last updated on March 21, 2019

Dogs have moved on from eating homework and on to dining on Benjamins. One Montana couple's dog ate money valued at $500 -- how's that for expensive taste?

But as the owner said, "It all comes out in the end" -- literally and figuratively.

Thankfully, the U.S. Treasury can save the day when your dog eats your homework cash.

This Too Shall Pass

Wayne Klinkel and his wife briefly left their 12-year-old golden retriever named Sundance in their car last Christmas, mistakenly within reach of six paper bills -- five $100 bills and one $1 bill. The Klinkels returned to find all of the bills except one gone. (Of course, it was the $1 bill, reports the Independent Record.)

Sundance, it seems, has the dietary proclivities of a goat. Ever since the Klinkels picked him up at a Wyoming animal shelter, they learned he would eat just about anything in sight.

So after Sundance swallowed the loot, Wayne Klinkel trailed his pooch around, excavated the scraps of cash from its excrement, triple-washed the cash scraps and pieced them together into the "crappiest" jigsaw puzzle of all time.

After he managed to tape the $100 bills back together, he sent them off to the U.S. Department of the Treasury and one year later -- voila! -- reimbursement!

It's not craptastic magic, it's the government's policy on mutilated currency.

Mutilated Currency

Damaged or "mutilated" currency may be mailed or personally delivered to the Bureau of Engraving and Printing for possible reimbursement. It's limited to bills. Mutilated coins must be sent to the U.S. Mint for evaluation.

Along with the mutilated currency, you must include a letter stating the estimated value of the currency and an explanation of how the currency became mutilated. In this case: "$500 -- My dog ate it."

Each case is examined by a mutilated currency examiner with processing time varying from six to 24 months, depending on the condition of the currency. In this case, it took a year...

Unfortunately for Sundance, you can't get reimbursed in cold, hard tasty cash. Your options are limited to an Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT) or a check. But that didn't seem to bother Klinkel.

"It was great to get the check after all the crap I went through," he told the Record, laughing.

See? Picking up your dog's poop pays off -- literally! Or, it can cost you.

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