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Composite photo courtesy of Havre Area Chamber of Commerce shows flaws in counterfeit Chamber gift certificates currently circulating in the Havre area. Chamber staff and Havre Police warn people to confirm authenticity of Chamber gift certificates they accept or purchase.
Havre Area Chamber of Commerce Director Shelli Sayers is warning the public that counterfeit Chamber gift certificates are being used in the community.
The gift certificates are often bought in batches and given out as bonuses or rewards, Sayers said, and it appears that someone, or more likely more than one person, has copied made copies of some of the certificates. The Chamber, she added, is working with Havre Police and local businesses to get the situation resolved and the perpetrators caught.
"This is sad and unfortunate. It's really disappointing," she said, especially at this time of year.
Havre Police Sgt. Justin Gomke, who is the lead investigator in the case, said he is following some leads.
He said that the counterfeit certificates bear a distinctive mark in the upper righthand quadrant, which looks like a hair or flaw was on the copier platen leaving left a semi-circle mark on all the pages. Another telltale sign on some of the counterfeit certificates that are in the amount of $100 is that a white box appears around the dollar amount where it appears written out and in numerical form and the white area blocks the background design.
Sayers said the counterfeit certificates also are printed on atypical card stock and the print has uneven or jagged edges. So far, the counterfeit certificates have been numbered 182918, 178807, 178786, 175495, 178344, 178971, or 179111.
Legitimate Chamber gift certificates, she added, are printed on slightly textured card stock and have slight embossing of the card stock where the red gift certificate number is printed. The embossing can be felt as a slight indentation of the numbers, and she cautioned anyone accepting a gift certificate to check for the telltale flaws and the embossing.
Gomke said that multiple local businesses have accepted some of the counterfeit certificates, and he and Sayers encouraged all businesses to check certificates they have taken as payment and report counterfeit certificates to the police.
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