Fed2 Star - the newsletter for the space trading game Federation 2

The weekly newsletter for Fed2
by ibgames

EARTHDATE: January 22, 2017

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REAL LIFE NEWS: NOW THAT’S HOW TO PAY YOUR TAX BILL

by Hazed

A man in Virginia was so incensed by the way the Department of Motor Vehicles was treated him that he decided to pay the $3,000 tax bill in coins.

The dispute began when Nick Stafford from Cedar Buff wanted to register three vehicles and pay the sales tax on them. The DMV refused to give him the direct office numbers for workers who would deal with him, so he filed a Freedom of Information request to get the numbers.

But when he was given a number, he rang it only to be told it wasn’t intended to be used for public enquiries.

He continued trying to get hold of phone numbers and eventually took the DMV to court. He lost his case but did manage to get the tax office’s numbers.

By this time he was so furious he decided to take his revenge, and paid up by delivering the tax in person, in coins, in five wheelbarrows, holding a total of 300,000 coins.

It took 11 members of staff at the DMV at least seven hours to count the coins, which weighed 1,600 pounds.

This reminds me of an incident from one of the very first jobs I had, back in the 1970s. I worked as a secretary in a large manufacturing company. This was in the days before ATMs so the only way to get money from your bank account was to take a cheque into a branch. But the plant was in a remote area, miles from any banks, so the company’s accounting department would cash cheques for its employees. One of my jobs was to take cheques from the people in my department to the cashiers, and bring back the cash.

One bright spark always said, as he handed me the cheque, “I’d like it all in pennies.” Very droll. So one day I called his bluff. I made arrangements in advance with the cashiers to make sure they had plenty of coins on hand, so when he gave me his cheque with his usual silly request, I laughed politely, went to the cashiers, returned with a massive bag of pennies and tipped them all over his desk – much to his dismay, and the amusement of everyone else!

Source: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2017/01/13/angry_yank_bloke_pays_the_taxman_with_five_
wheelbarrows_of_coins/

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