When the UK left the EU, legislation.gov.uk published EU legislation that had been published by the EU up to IP completion day (31 December 2020 11.00 p.m.). On legislation.gov.uk, these items of legislation are kept up-to-date with any amendments made by the UK since then.
This is the original version as it was originally adopted in the EU.
This legislation may since have been updated - see the latest available (revised) version
Euro banknotes are classified into one of the following categories and are physically separated by category. Machines which do not check euro banknotes for fitness do not need to distinguish between categories B1 and B2.
| Category | Properties | Treatment | |
|---|---|---|---|
| A | (i) Objects not recognised as euro banknotes; (ii) suspect counterfeit euro banknotes; or (iii) euro banknotes that are not clearly authenticated | (i) Not recognised as euro banknotes because of any of the following:
(ii) Identified as suspect counterfeit euro banknotes because image and format recognised, but one or more authentication feature checked by the machine not detected or clearly out of tolerance (iii) Euro banknotes that are not clearly authenticated because image and format recognised, but not all authentication features checked by the machine recognised because of quality and/or tolerance deviations. In most cases unfit euro banknotes | Return by the machine to the operator for further evaluation and treatment (i) objects not recognised as euro banknotes: after visual evaluation by a staff member these are separated from the suspect counterfeit euro banknotes and euro banknotes that are not clearly authenticated; (ii) suspect counterfeit euro banknotes; and (iii) euro banknotes that are not clearly authenticated: these are processed separately and handed over for final authentication to the competent national authorities immediately, at the latest 20 working days after deposit in the machine. |
| B1 | Euro banknotes that are identified as genuine and fit | All authenticity and fitness checks carried out by the machine giving positive results | Can be used for recirculation. Credited to the account holder |
| B2 | Euro banknotes that are identified as genuine and unfit | All authenticity checks carried out by the machine giving positive results. At least one fitness criterion checked giving a negative result | Cannot be used for recirculation and are returned to the NCB. Credited to the account holder |
The authenticity and fitness checks are conducted in the same pass. In this pass, any category B1 euro banknotes must be sorted into one stationary output stacker, whereas both category A and B2 euro banknotes must be sorted into a separate stationary output stacker that does not have any physical contact with any category B1 euro banknote.
If a category A euro banknote is identified as being present in the second output stacker, the operator must re-run the euro banknote(s) from the second output stacker. In this second pass, euro banknotes suspected to be counterfeits must be separated from the category B2 euro banknotes by sorting the former into a dedicated output stacker.
Each time a category A euro banknote is processed, the machine must stop the processing immediately and keep the category A euro banknote in a position that avoids any physical contact with authenticated euro banknotes.
The result of the authenticity check must be indicated for any single category A euro banknote on a display.
The machine must check for the presence of a category A euro banknote when it stops processing, and processing can only be resumed after the physical removal of the category A euro banknote by the operator.
For each stop of the processing mode no more than one category A euro banknote can be accessible to the operator.
All content is available under the Open Government Licence v3.0 except where otherwise stated. This site additionally contains content derived from EUR-Lex, reused under the terms of the Commission Decision 2011/833/EU on the reuse of documents from the EU institutions. For more information see the EUR-Lex public statement on re-use.
