Limerick businessman praised after recovering pensioner's fuel money
A LIMERICK businessman has been praised after returning a significant sum of money to a customer who had left it in his shop by accident.
Pascal King, who runs two branches of Hangers dry cleaners in the city centre and Castletroy Town Centre, took delivery of an elderly woman's jacket.
As he does every time, he checked the pockets before the garment went in for cleaning.
However, he was astonished to find in one pocket, a wallet stuffed full of €50 notes totalling €1,600.
Money it turns out the pensioner needed for her fuel payment, and was desperately hunting around her home for.
"Everything is checked and double checked to make sure not just for valuables, but for things that would damage a load - the likes of ink, the likes of tissues. We'd always check and double check," Pascal explained.
Upon finding the sum of money, he contacted the customer who had left the jacket in with him. It turns out the woman who had dropped it off was doing so on behalf of her elderly neighbour.
Taking up the story, the woman - who asked not to be identified - said: "A week ago, an elderly neighbour in her late 80s, asked me to drop in a coat to be dry cleaned into Castletroy Hangers. I got a phone call at 7pm that evening from Pascal, and he said some money had been left in the pocket. I just said, sure grand, i'll collect it next week."
However, given the significant sum involved, Pascal asked her to come and collect it as soon as she could.
"I went to my neighbour and explained to her she had left money in her pocket. She was actually looking for it. She couldn't find where it was and needed it for her home heating oil. So I collected it the following morning and gave it back to her. She was relieved as you can imagine," the woman added.
She praised Pascal's "honesty and goodness" and bought the businessman a box of buns and tin of sweets to say thank you to him.
He said: "What goes around comes around. I'd hate to think if I was on the receiving end, someone wouldn't return it to me - it could be me next week! I was delighted to be able to give it back. I actually checked that pocket, and felt something bulky in the coat pocket. I thought it was a packet of tissues, and it turned out to be a wallet. When I opened it, I found €1,600 inside of it."
Surprisingly, Pascal says he would regularly find large sums of money left by accident in pockets when they leave suits and other clothes in for dry cleaning.
"I found €700 in a pair of trouser pockets not too long ago! There was a well-known accountant, and we were cleaning his suit and checked his coat pockets when he was at the counter, and when the presser was pressing his suit, she felt some bulk in the lining of the suit jacket. She found €400! Both he and I had checked the pockets and neither he or I found it. I had a lady in the other day, and she was cleaning a school skirt for her daughter, and there was a €50 note inside it. She came in to pay for her dry cleaning and was €42 richer going out the door," he said.
One of the other common things he finds left in pockets is the Best Man's speech from a wedding!
"That's a regular one," he laughed, "Once they are done and dusted, they're forgotten about!"