Karen's Malicious Compliance Embarrassingly Fails After Employee Outsmarts Her At Her Own Game

Imagine sitting behind a desk and seeing a customer walk in with a particularly full bag. The growing dread, as you realize they really do intend to pay a significant amount of money using just coins. Sometimes people don’t have a choice, after all, coins are legal tender. But some want to make your day miserable. But in every danger, there is an opportunity, and some have the wits to seize it.

This was the situation one internet user found themselves in when a ticked-off woman came in to pay a fine. She had a master plan to maliciously comply with her punishment, but, unfortunately, for her, OP was also skilled in the art of malicious compliance.

In some cases, the cleck would have been in the clear if they decided to just reject the coins. In Ohio, a court ruled that forcing a clerk to count unrolled coins was not reasonable, although the coins have to still be accepted as US legal tender. So at the very least, OP could have possibly made the woman put the quarters into rolls. That being said, it's also not reasonable to have clerks memorize US court cases just to do their job. In Canada, the practice was so common and caused enough headaches for governmental officials, that they limited the number of coins one could use to pay. For each Canadian dollar owed, only a certain amount of coins could be submitted.

Australia has similar laws, Like the story posted by OP, a man tried to pay a fine using just coins. In this case, it was only a $60 fine, but that still came up to 1200 five-cent coins. He was so happy with his own malicious compliance, that he ignored the clerks' protests that they didn’t actually have to accept it. He left without a receipt or his mountain of coins, having lost $60 and not paid his fine. Under Australian law, the government can limit the number of coins it will accept proportional to the amount being paid. Private entities can go further and are in no way compelled to accept any legal tender if they don’t want to.

Many American laws are set by local authorities, ranging from the county to the state. Despite the aforementioned Ohio example, sometimes Americans can get away with truly malicious compliance. A Virginia man paid a $3,000 tax bill using literally wheelbarrows of coins, with a total weight of about 1600 pounds. He was helped by 11 others to dump the cash in the DMV of Cedar Bluff. Under US law, the staff had to accept the payment and spent seven hours meticulously counting the coins. To his credit, the man had rolled them beforehand and spent around $400 on the wheelbarrows alone.

Some countries in the EU, similar to Canada, have effectively removed the smallest forms of currency, namely pennies and 1 and 2-Euro-cent coins from circulation. Some are still in use, but now in the Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, Finland, and Ireland, it’s normal for shops to round the purchase to the nearest multiple of 5 cents. Some stores will still accept the coins, however, as cash purchases are sometimes encouraged due to the costs of credit card transactions. Some EU nations also impose limits on how many coins a governmental institution can accept for each Euro being paid.