# Check for $0.00

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-for-0-00/541977>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [June 4, 2010, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-for-0-00/541977 "2010-06-04T20:32:54Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 2

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**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\
**Post date:** [June 7, 2010, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-for-0-00/541977/21 "2010-06-07T22:06:35Z")

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> [@BigT](#):
>
> My understanding was that software that sends out $0.00 checks is generally deciding whether to send a check before rounding. In other words, you have a non-zero balance, meaning you need to receive a check, but the amount is something like $0.0043, and thus is rounded to $0.00 before the check is actually sent.

I have never written that line of code but I’ve been in software for 30 years and anybody that would actually do that deserves to be fired. However, account balances are not generally kept to a precision greater than $0.01, so the above explanation may be specious.

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**Author:** ![JSexton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/96bed5/32.png) [@JSexton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JSexton)\
**Post date:** [June 8, 2010, 12:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/check-for-0-00/541977/22 "2010-06-08T00:34:32Z")

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> [@CookingWithGas](#):
>
> No, that would divide zero by 2. Still zero. 🙂

Well, crap. How did I think that was right?

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