I actually found that oddly interesting as well. After seeing that, N. American/UK method looks oh so messy and inefficient, though not THE most messy and inefficient.

This also gave me a flashback as to how particular I am about my bills (when I have cash, which is rare these days). It's a residual behavior left over from waiting tables all through school, denominations are together in ascending order, president's heads right side up and facing towards me. 

posted by Vanalyn at 09:27PM CST on February 19

This looks reasonable -- but is there any supporting evidence? Anyone from one of these cultures who can verify? 

posted by mrflip at 08:03AM CST on February 20

I'll vouch for the China/Singapore version. I'd say it's true for the most part, with given variations (the way that I would say people in the US also use the same handhold to count bills onto a table/bank counter, etc.). Also, China seems to think it has a huge counterfeiting problem, so many places have machines like you'd find at US casinos, which (I guess) verify a Y100 (or presumably larger) bill, and count if there are multiple. When I've been at the post office, bank, etc., the teller counts by hand, sometimes twice, and then runs the bills through the machine twice.  

posted by ms cegenation at 09:33AM CST on February 20

Some of this might have to do with the color and apparance of local bills.

The american version might be slower and more inefficient because our bills are all the same color and have the same layout, and are thus harder to tell apart without looking at the entire bill.

Euro notes, though, for one example, have different sizes and colors, and thus, can be much more easily and accurately counted by just looking at a corner. 

posted by Valatan at 12:51PM CST on February 20

An advantage of the US and was it Turkmenistan? version is it allows you to see the entire bill face so you can (potentially) observe serial #'s, printing errors, folded or partial bills etc. 

posted by TowtruckJohnny at 05:48PM CST on February 20