A rash of counterfeit money has hit the area in recent weeks, with police departments in Elgin, Algonquin, West Dundee and Lake in the Hills have all handling reports of the bogus bills.
All four area departments say they recovered the funny money -- including $5 and $100 bills -- during the month of September.
I'm not sure why this even hit the news. Every month, about $20,000 in counterfeit money is passed in the Chicago metro area--authorities aren't seeing, as pointed out in the article, any unusual pattern here - it's the amount they usually see. But when you buy gas or groceries and get cash back, make sure you take a close look at the bills before you put them back in your wallet. And for what it's worth, the secret service isn't involved in this yet. The Elgin police are doing a preliminary investigation hoping to nab the source of some of these bills, which reportedly are poor quality fakes.