TO LOSE €31m in a bank robbery may be seen as a misfortune. To lose the serial numbers of the missing bank notes starts to look like carelessness.

Northern Bank, victim of one of the world’s biggest bank robberies two weeks ago, has been criticised after it was revealed it gave the wrong serial numbers to police.

The embarrassment came to light after two £20 notes thought to have been stolen were used at Dundonald International Ice Bowl in east Belfast on Thursday. The Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) admitted yesterday that the notes were legitimately held.

It has now emerged that Northern Bank provided the PSNI with the wrong serial numbers. About 50,000 £20 notes that were listed as stolen may in fact be legitimately held by the public. Northern Bank has now given a revised list to police and banks.

The PSNI said: “Not all the serial numbers supplied by the Northern Bank have turned out to have been part of the robbery. This has led to some unfruitful lines of inquiry, but as the investigation is ongoing it is not possible to comment further on specific cases.”

A spokesman for Dundonald Ice Bowl said the two notes had been returned to them.

Sir Reg Empey, the Ulster Unionist MLA for East Belfast, said: “The fact that the bank issued some wrong numbers is doubly embarrassing for them and creates a further loss of confidence. They took several days before releasing the numbers and still were not fully informed of what was contained in their vaults.

“The staff were very vigilant but that is no good if they are looking for the wrong numbers. This calls into question the bank’s systems. I think most people find it astonishing that not only can they have their vaults cleaned out without any technology intervening, but they can’t even get the numbers of the notes right. I think this is discouraging for the public.”

Almost two weeks after the raid, police seem no closer to recovering the proceeds or making any arrests. On Thursday officers carried out a third set of searches in west Belfast but recovered only some counterfeit DVDs.

Robbers stole £22m from Northern Bank’s city centre vaults on December 20. The raid is being blamed on the Provisional IRA but republican sources deny any IRA involvement.

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