While I normallly dont like jigsaw puzzles..

[Grumpmeister]

I'd give this one a go. Someone cut up £10,000 and a lucky binman found the remains.

It's some jigsaw puzzle - £10,000 in cut-up £10 and £20 notes. What tips can the experts give the binman who made this lucky find, and is now piecing the shredded money back together?

Six months ago, Graham Hill found £10,000 crammed into two litter bins in Lincoln. 
Damaged notes with legible serial numbers can be exchanged
To reassemble, sort pieces into piles - corners, Queen's head, etc
Patience and hard work are crucial

The only problem: someone had carefully cut the notes into thousands of inch-square pieces. Even the serial numbers had been cut in half.

Since no-one has claimed the cash, the binman can keep it, and the Bank of England will give him new notes for old.

To qualify as exchangeable, each note will have to be painstakingly reassembled with the following features legible:

Signature of the Bank of England's Chief Cashier, Andrew Bailey
The "promise to pay the bearer on demand" (near top of the note, under Bank of England heading)
BOTH the unique serial numbers that appear on each note 

"It is important to have both serial numbers - otherwise we might find ourselves paying out twice on the same note," says a bank spokeswoman.

However, she stresses the bank treats each request to replace damaged notes on a case-by-case basis.

"We recognise it is sometimes impossible to meet all our requirements - this happened when we had a lot of claims for water-damaged notes following the 2007 floods."

The bank receives about £40m in claims for damaged or mutilated notes each year.

In 2007, £2,407,000-worth of flood or fire damaged notes were returned, and £2,303,000 in torn or partial notes. And the bank also received nearly 5,000 "chewed and eaten" notes - worth £92,000 in total.

Virtue of patience

Before Mr Hill can even think about exchanging his find for cash, he needs to put together all the fragments.

Jigsaw puzzle supremo Eric Smith has good advice for the lucky binman: be careful, be patient, and have a system.   Every time someone walked past, a bit of note would blow onto the floor

Kim Aumann, whose daughter found £2,000 in bits and pieces

"First you need to sort all the fragments into piles: a pile for each colour, a pile of straight note edges and separate piles for distinctive bits - like the Queen's head and serial numbers.

"Have a complete £10 and £20 note at hand to work from, like the picture on the jigsaw puzzle box.

"Then put the edges together to make a frame for each note, and fill each frame with individual pictures and numbers."

Mr Smith advises the use of a special puzzler's "jig-roll" - a large bolt of cloth to keep half-built notes on, which is rolled up at night.

The 73-year-old puzzler made the headlines in July when he finished the world's biggest jigsaw - a 24,000-piece monster measuring 12ft long by six feet wide.

The Stoke-on-Trent pensioner has only ever lost three puzzle pieces in the 30 years he has indulged his hobby. 
Eric Smith with his 24,000 piece jigsaw. Be patient, he advises

"When I read the story about Graham, I was very tempted to give him a call and offer my help. I could definitely have a go on that puzzle."

Mr Smith believes it could take at least three months, working evenings only, to piece together the cash.

"Think of the incentive though - a £10,000 prize at the end of all that hard work."

Although using friends and family to help sort the pieces into piles might cut the time, he advises Mr Hill to work alone when fitting the pieces together.

"Otherwise he'll find that whoever he is working with is looking for exactly the same pieces as he is."

It's not the first time someone has found a bag of banknote fragments.

In 2003, Brighton schoolgirls Rachel Aumann and Maisie Balley noticed pieces of money "blowing around like confetti" - in all about £2,000 in torn-up notes.  WHO, WHAT, WHY?
 
A regular feature in the BBC News Magazine - aiming to answer some of the questions behind the headlines

It took the two 12-year-olds and Rachel's stepfather Peter Goodall more than a year to reassemble the fragments, working an hour every night.

But their reward came when the Bank of England accepted the notes - and now Rachel has a nest egg for her university education.

Said her mother, Kim Aumann: "Peter had a big wallpaper-paste table set up permanently in the front room.

"It became a routine for him - watching TV while putting the notes together and I think he quite enjoyed it in the end.

"It did drive us mad sometimes - every time someone walked past a bit of note would blow on to the floor."

It took a long time for Mr Goodall to find a workable system. "The one he adopted in the end sounds like the one the jigsaw puzzle expert recommends - separating notes into piles and filling in the frames," says Ms Aumann.

"I would wish the binman good luck in piecing together his £10,000 find. I'd say to him: it's fun and go for it."

[Barman]

They must be stolen surely...? 

It would be hilarious if he stuck them all together and they turned out to be the proceeds of a bank job... 

[Grumpmeister]

He handed them into the police and they sat on it for six months. They couldnt find the owner and couldnt find any evidence of criminal activity.

I was wondering if in a moment of total cataclysmic brilliance Nick accidentally put the money for the new rood through the shredder?

[Nick]

We don't need a new rood 

[Snoopy]

PEDANT ALERT

[Grumpmeister]

I notice you havent said anything about a mishap with a shredder through Nick....

[Darwins Selection]

"Spare ye rood and spoile ye childe"