A firm that recycles electrical goods has been thanked after staff found a heater and a wad of cash that had been thrown away in error.

Justin Greenaway, commercial manager of SWEEEP Kuusakoski, in Gas Road, Sittingbourne, was able to hand back the money to Aziz Moulai last Wednesday.

Mr Greenaway said: “Imagine spending years saving up enough cash to purchase a surprise present for your loved one only to accidentally recycle the electronic heater used as the safe storage place for that cash. This is what happened to Mr Moulai.”

The electric radiator, which contained an unknown amount of cash, had been binned by Mr Moulai’s wife while he was away in France.

Upon returning and realising the heater had gone, Mr Moulai, who lives in Greenwhich, made a panicked call to Greenwich Reuse and Recycling Centre in London.

The quick actions from Veolia – which runs Greenwich’s household waste site – allowed the lorry load of waste electronics to be tracked.

The load then had to be tipped into a safe, quarantine bay by SWEEEP, which processes about 150 tonnes a day of broken electronic gadgets – otherwise it would have been added to an already large heap.

The cash-containing-delivery from Greenwich had around 3,600 items of electronic waste and finding the one item was a classic needle in a haystack situation.

SWEEEP’s staff started sorting through the electronics late in the afternoon and had to finish the following morning when daylight returned.

The money was found throughout the load, but all was collected together and handed back to Mr Moulai.

He said: “Really, I can’t find words to thank you guys. Thank you so very, very much.”

Mr Greenaway added: “It’s been a pleasure to be able to give back the money. If he had phone a day later, it would have been recycled.”

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