A decision obliges exchange offices to accept old currencies in North-East Syria

The “Cash and Payments” Office of the Democratic Autonomous Administration in North-East Syria issued a decision requiring exchange shop owners to accept old currencies from customers in denominations of dollars or Syrian pounds as long as the counters in the offices accept those currencies.

The decision, according to Aso News Network sources, requires money exchange shop owners to accept old banknotes whose numbers clearly appear.

The decision prohibits shop owners from rejecting the currency or reducing its basic value, under penalty of legal liability and taking legal action against those who violate the decision.

Hammam Mulla Ahmed, an employee at an exchange office, told Aso News Network that the issuance of the decision means that exchange companies must now accept old currencies of the dollar and Syrian pound denominations, without reducing their value.

Exchange shops used to reduce the value of foreign or old Syrian currency when accepting or disbursing it in exchange for trading it.

A source in the Finance Authority from the city of Qamishlo/al-Qamishli (who preferred not to be named) repeated the decision of the Cash and Payments Office, stating that exchange shops had previously refused to receive old currencies unless the customer accepted a reduction in their value.

The source describes that this was “a game played by the large exchange offices,” and adds that in fact, they do not lose the value of the cash currencies even if they are accepted to receive them. “The worn out currency is exchanged by the owners of the exchange shops or exchanged with the central bank in the Kurdistan region of Iraq,” Or the Central Bank of Syria, or the Commercial Bank of Syria, if the office is licensed with the Syrian government, and this is within a monetary policy according to which banks deal.”

According to private sources for Aso News Network, the currency problem may have come after complaints from residents in Derik / Al-Malikiyah, that exchange offices refused to receive Syrian currency in denominations of five hundred (500) and one thousand (1000) old Syrian pounds, which created a crisis between the residents and the offices. Money exchange deals with the official currency of the region.

The same source stated that the decision to control the currency was issued after several decisions issued by the Monetary and Payments Office, which directs monetary policies in the regions of North-East Syria, indicating that the primary goal of issuing the decision is to control exploitation operations, i.e. (exploitation of circulation) in the region.

It is noteworthy that the decision to trade the old currency was issued after exchange offices in the region refrained from trading the old currency (Syrian dollar), or trading an old dollar in exchange for deducting a certain amount from it.