I and family had planned a nice trip to visit family back home. in frankfurt airport after passport check and hand luggage check suddendly 2 Custom check our hand luggages and found 3000 euro cash and a time deposite saving account book from a bank of our home country from my wife with value more than 20K euro.

We do know that there is limit 10K euro for custom BUT we didn't know that a saving account book from a bank in our home country where the money is already in our home country also has to registered.
in the information brochure (multi lingual) wasn't mention sparbüch belong to cash but finally I read in custom website that certain sparbuch belongst to cash (but no explanation in details in what case belong to cash).
In english version cash means cash or easily convertible assets eg. bonds, shares, traveller's checques) while in germany verstion there is additional punkt punkt punkt behind it.

I got a paper called 'informationsblatt zur mündlichen Einleitung eines Bußgeldverfahrens' and was asked to contact the person in the paper to discuss the case. it may happen they drop the case or proceed with the fine and I may discuss the fine with the custom :-).

need your help:
1. what to do? immediately contact lawyer (I have rechschutzversicherung, although I am not sure if this kind of case will be covered by my insurance or not) OR try to contact custom people 1st?
2. So do any of you have experiences with this kind of case?
3. it is written as steuerordnungswidrigkeit. will this go to personal criminal record??

I can't access internet regularly in my home country, so I apologize if I can't reply immediatley to your comment AND thank you in advance for your help or input!

dear all trust7ers,

no reply or feedback

Hi VP_2004,

I Assume this kind of scenario has never been experienced by any of our members and so no answers as you see.

But , i have a question.

When were these checks done
- When leaving to India or ?.

Was it just checked at Random by the officer ?.

Pure bad luck though.

///

the check was done randomly in terminal C.
The procedure that I have experienced before was
1st luggage check in front of the terminal then
passport check.
this time was 1st passport check then luggage check. afterthat custom people randomly choose couple to check.

I am not afraid of the random check and if I have known that sparbuch has to be registered I will do it for sure. NOTHING TO BE HIDE here.

however I am pissed by the fact that the information brochure is not clear and my poor 8 months old baby has to experience this without any good will for special baby treatment (maybe baby is really not welcome here).

Rule may change time to time. How or when can a passenger know the rule or modified rule? Why the airline people do not say anything during the check-in time? Some of the person carry cash because of high trasnfer fee (some one mentioned its possible by 5 Euro but dont know by which system, just check how much Deutsche / Commerzbank charge for it- they charge almost 20 Euro for trasfering 1000Euro) and all the earnings are very hard. So, no one really expects such bothering/trouble!

Once I heard someone was carrying money and caught by the immigration, he was asked to show how did he get those money! And when he showed his bank transfer paper then nothing happened! I also saw a TV report where the immigration was checking women (flight from china) for the gold ornaments. It was really strange when they were fined although it was for their personal use (the lady got couple of ear rings).

But still I cannot believe that immigration asked something for a foreign savings book. And dont understand as well why a passenger needs to bear the cost where the immigration is responsible for the delay!!

It seems a baby cannot carry 10K Euro otherwise there shouldnt be any problem i.e. [(20K + 3K) = 2 Adult + 1 Baby !no fine ;-)] ...

BTW, where to find that information brochure?

@moin76,

//some one mentioned its possible by 5 Euro but dont know by which system, just check how much Deutsche / Commerzbank charge for it- they charge almost 20 Euro for trasfering 1000Euro)//

you pay 20 euro becuase of your ignorance, banks will squeez your pocket as much as you wish to get squeezed. there are endless of indian banks and trusted money transfer websites supported by reputed comapnies/banks. Do some search and survey if your money is hard earned else keep on paying banks. dont blame others, its only your ignorance that you pay unjustified charges and lot of inconvinience such as visiting banks in person as if you are using age old money order method. Just go online dude and transfer money upto 10000 euro for less than 5 euro and the money gets in your indian account within 2 working days. For additional two euros you get insurance cover.

you should read my treath in other article.
10K each person mean you bring 10K and your partner bring 10K. in case 2 person travel but only 1 person bring 20K, that person also break the law. I have read article in www.focus.de about this. there was example if 2 person are in a car, if the money is in the car then things is complicated who from 2 person break the law, ha ha ha. very funny rule.

each of them have 1 brochure in their pocket, which they never read maybe.

@subir79,

First thanks for your reply...

//dont blame others//
Actually I didnt blame others, I know that each system has its own advantages or disadvantages! I have no problem living with that!

//Just go online dude//
I didnt tell that I am not using online but the "age old money order method". Just for the information, even sometimes online transfer could cost more compare to the traditional form fill-up and transfer method!!

//the money gets in your indian account//
Are you sure that I have my account in India and I just want to send money to India only? Listen dude(!), there exists some other countries as well where we may need to transfer money. Perhaps there exists some good online service to transfer money in India but it is also true there are some frauds too! So, if you have experienced with 5 Euro fees and willing to share the method you may tell us the way! I think it will be more helpful for any Indians (even for other people too) rather just to say search on the net! And where is the meaning to use a forum if we all need to search and survey ourselves? Where is meaning to reinvent the same wheel again and again? I think we use this forum because we want to exchange our experiences, to help each other, to feel like a family. As someone said, we should stop assuming other situation and tell something based on the assumption. I hope you got the point!!

Thanks again for your forum contribution!

The basis for the obligation to declare is rooted in European Law, in the EC Regulation No 1889/2005 of the European Parliament and of the council dated 26 October 2005 on controls of cash entering or leaving the Community.

http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/site/en/oj/2005/l_309/l_30920051125en00090012.pdf

Now, it may indeed be confusing that CASH is not only banknotes and coins.

Both in the English version and the German version the relevant terms "cash" and "Barmittel"
are defined in Article 2 of the Regulation (see for the German version: http://eur-lex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/site/de/oj/2005/l_309/l_30920051125de00090012.pdf). Bank notes and coins are just one part of it. The other part is, roughly speaking, comprised of negotiable instruments. Because of the technical language and the use of the German word "Inhaberpapiere" in the lengthy definition, it is not all evident, as Detlef pointed out, that a savings account book falls into this category. In German law there is a neat distinction between so called "Inhaberpapiere" and "Legitimationspapiere". Both are "Wertpapiere" which is the overall general term. A German Sparbuch is a so called "qualifiziertes Legitimationspapier", but no "Inhaberpapier" in the technical sense. What about an Indian savings account book? Is the bank obliged to pay out the money to the bearer of the savings account book simply because he displays it? Anyway, the fact that the German Sparbuch is a "Wertpapier" after all is the principal argument of the customs department. They say it is EU law, so any "Wertpapier", or "instrument" as it is called in the English version, falls under the definition. This is demonstrated in their "Merkblatt", too, (http://www.zoll.de/e0_downloads/c0_merkblaetter/merkblatt_bargeldanzeigepflicht.pdf) which simply lists "Wertpapier" and mentions a number of them but not a savings account book (Sparbuch). In addition, the customs department has procedural guidelines which also include savings account books in that definition. Those guidelines, however, cannot derogate the letter of the law.

In summary, if you are eventually faced with a monetary fine, filing an objection (Widerspruch) against it could still hold a chance of changing the outcome.


contact@kanzlei-jain.de

@moiin76,

i am giving you opinion, why shall i suggest you details of transfer method, bank name, list of countries etc.? one of the forum member explicitly ask with subject "hard cash to india"

sorry i dont know the method how to send money to Afghanistan or Iraq etc. You may try "Hawala"

@subir79

I am laughing reading your post :-). Cool down DUDE!!!

It seems you still didn’t get the point of “replying based on own assumption”, anyway, learning has no age- so, keep trying boy ;-).

//one of the forum member explicitly ask with subject "hard cash to india"//
But your OPINION (tnx) did not point and quote the topic starter’s user name (i.e. VP_2004) but mine!

BTW, I tried "Hawala" in google, and the result is ....... lol...

Have a good sleep...

P.S: I hope you did not mean that if someone explicitly writes a country name in the subject, all people should have come from that country to discuss and opinion/suggestion should only be pointed to that country only!! Anyway, we love India!!

@vakalat
Thanks for those links, of course it will help us!

@vakalat: thanks for the long explanation.

however I don't understand one point. I offered to declare my postbank sparkonto card (which is basically sparbuch too only this one without book). And they said no need to register this one.
Do you know why?

btw: do you have good experience with the lawyer with contact address that you have provided?

Saving book or a pass book of the bank or a statement of the bank or a Fixed dposit confirmation is not cash.

@Havehope - what do you mean?
is it a statement based on law Or is it your personal opinion?

If you give anyof the above like passbook e.t.c to a third party ,he cannot make use of it.it cannot be considered as cash.

Hi all,

I come back to you to tell the result of my case.
I have hired a lawyer to represent me.
Here are some information for you:
- Under German Law, Sparbuch is indeed classified as Wertpapier and therefore has to be declared when you bring the book to third country.
- It doesn't matter where the account is OR where the money is! -> also defined by law

Luckily the sparbuch that we have, isn't fully comply with the germany Sparbuch definition.

We argue with this point and the charged again us, has been dropped.

Lesson learn from this:
It opened my eyes, how racist one can be.
If you care to stand in front of the check point
at the airport, you can counted the percentages
of who is and isn't checked.

have a nice day!

Hi,

Gott Sei Dank ! It is resolved favoring you.

What about EC Karte?
Is it mandatory to declare EC Karte with over EUR10K or 20K in the Customs in Frankfurt ?

Actually in the second day, I showed up in their main office in the airport. I have argued with the guy. I showed them all my credit cards and EC cards, I said I have to declare them because with those cards, I can pull more than 20K euro.
But they said no need to declare those card.

I got confused while reading this thread.

Does it mean that I can not take EC karte( having more than 20k euro) with me?