Perhaps the recent mandatory switch to Chip and Pin credit cards in the UK wasn't merely something designed to wind up the proportion of the populous of Britain who can't quite reliably grasp which way they should be inserted into the never-hidden-from-public-view chip reader. Whilst the Poorhouse would dispute that they couldn't be easier to use - not having to put them in a slot reader and not having to remember a PIN are 2 ways in which we'd venture they would be easier to use - it does at least prevent the sort of potential fraud that John Hargrave from Zug went out to test.

After using his "sign to authorise" credit card about 15,000 times, he began to suspect - as any rational person would - that people weren't over-detailed in their comparison examination of the signature on the card vs the signature on a receipt. His challenge: discover how ridiculous and obviously fake he could sign his receipt for and still walk away with the goods. Somehow the escapade turned out to be quite hilarious, but had he been using someone else's card for the project at hand, they would likely not have been quite as amused.

Starting off with the tactic of random scrawling, increasing the intensity as time went on, all was well. The grid pictured with this article also did the trick. A 'X', some hieroglyphics, other people's names and simple sentences? All fine. The name and portrait of a fish at an aquarium bought entrance to the place. Even electronic signature-checkers stood no ground - an illustration of the human digestive system with particular emphasis on the rectum went straight through. A musical ditty? Why not!

However, he did come a cropper at the culmination of the story. To find out how, and to see the much more amusing length illustrated version of the story, get yourself down to the great tale of the Credit Card Prank.

The Poorhouse was also inspired idea of the reverse tip. When presented, most often in restaurants, with the embarrassing and complicated credit card receipts with the blank space to add a tip in even if the service was atrocious, nowhere does it say you can't use negative numbers right?