I went with the version of the question in the poll box: “Which do you normally carry on you when you leave the house?”
In that case, accumulating change during the day doesn’t count.
I carry a debit card, a credit card, and $5-$10 in paper money. My checkbook stays home, since I only use it for rent.
I didn’t even see that.
Paper money yes, coins if/when change is received. Checks never.
Cash, always. I’m one of those wacky folk who think using debit for everything is a big hassle, with all the keeping track of receipts that it involves. I’ll usually get $200 at the ATM every payday (bi-weekly.)
Gas and the roughly-monthly run to Wal-mart for general household stuff goes on credit, for the 1% cash back. Aldi doesn’t take credit, so it’s cash there. I refuse to be one of Those People who pull out the plastic for a $2 convenience store purchase.
I only carry coins if I’m going to work. The drink machine in the break room only accepts bills when it feels like it, and the quality of bill it will take seems to vary from one day to the next. This keeps me from accumulating huge amounts of coinage. Except for pennies. Pennies need to die. When the coffee can on the kitchen counter is full of pennies, I happily give up the percentage Coinstar charges just so I don’t have to count the damn things.
I think the last time I used a check in a retail establishment was 1996. Checks still get used for the mortgage, utilities and credit card bill.
I use a coin pouch for my change and have cash in my wallet
I live in the US, not the Isle of Man.
I carry coins, bills, and a checkbook, and also a debit and credit card. Most of my meatspace transactions are by debit card. I make a point of writing a check to various small businesses, because they do indeed incur a charge or fee if I use a card. And in my experience, paying by check and paying by cash are about tied in speed, assuming that the check writer has already filled in the date and payee and possibly even signed the check before getting to the register (as in at a grocery store or Target or some such). In an express line, though, a check writer might not have the time to fill out the check beforehand. Paying by card, even a debit card which requires a PIN to be punched in, is so very much quicker, assuming that the card isn’t declined and that the magnetic reader is actually reading the stripe. And it’s more accurate, too. A lot of cashiers can’t count back the change, they’ll only give back what the register tells them to do.
I was thinking of what you carry on your person, in your pockets or in a purse. Hence the wording “carry on you.”
Stuff you carry in your car is different. Hell, I used to keep my toolbox in the trunk of my car, but I didn’t feel that I was carrying it around. 
In that case, I carry I debit card, credit card, and my license. I hate purses and girl pants lack decent pockets, so I like a wallet key ring I can carry in my hands when needed and toss in a desk drawer at work.
I carry coins, cash and my debit/credit cards. My checkbook lives in my desk at home, and is used soley for paying bills.
I think the last time I had to write a check for something when I was out was at the DMV, and that is highly unusual.
I figured that people wouldn’t do the same thing all the time, hence the word ‘normally’ as in “Which do you normally carry on you.” If such instances are the exception or the rule hopefully determined your answer.
I do this too. At any rate, you probably don’t usually have coins in your pocket. YMMV, but if most days included at least transaction where I got coinage back as part of my change, I’d probably just give up and start carrying coins again when I left the house. Fortunately, that’s not the case.
This. I have a check book squirreled away in my car and in my backpack for emergencies but I don’t like carrying a checkbook on me.
Credit most of the time. Have cash and debit in the wallet for speed/emergencies.
I don’t understand paying bills with checks. Why screw with the mail and writing a check when you can do it online?
I’ll only bring the checkbook if I know I’ll have a specific need for it - pretty much everyone takes plastic these days.
I usually have at least some paper money, and usually also some coins. Rarely spend the coins though - periodically I’ll dump them into a basket then once or twice a year roll 'em up and deposit them.
I never carry cash or coins unless I’ve had to get a “yuppie food coupon” (aka $20 bill) from the ATM to pay at the nearby Popeye’s Chicken (the only fast food restaurant I know that doesn’t take ATM cards, but they’re good and close to home so I deal). After that I carry around the change from that until I’ve spent it. I can’t remember the last time I had more than $20 in my pocket.
I used to write checks at the grocery store way back in the dark ages, but I’ve used my ATM card for years. Very rarely write checks anymore, and only then for one-off bills (like the car registration). All my other bill paying is online.
Anyone remember the days when, in order to write a check at a store, you had to have one of their check-cashing cards??? We moved to the DC area 20+ years ago and had checking cashing cards for the Giant (IIRC, it took several weeks for that to arrive in the mail; we had a provisional card before that), and also one at Sutton Place Gourmet.
I don’t recall when was the last time I even saw anyone writing a check at Giant. Nowadays of course I guess they’ve got those clearing systems so you don’t need to have a pre-approved check card.
We still write a fair number of checks, actually. Especially this time of year when the kids need their school fees etc. to be paid. And I paid a home repair bill just the other day by check. I just don’t carry the checkbook around (which has been inconvenient a time or two, I admit).
Every once in a while, I’ll carry a single check in my wallet if I know I’m going to need one that day (going to the hair salon, for example). But otherwise, just bills & coins.
What are these things “cheques” you are talking about? Around here (Sweden) they are on par with dodos.
I think we’ve had this discussion already.
What I think we ended up learning is that in Europe it is easy to make a person-to-person electronic transfer from one bank account to another, whereas in the U.S. that is still not available in most circumstances (although electronic bill pay from a person to a company is widely available). That’s why checks are still around in the U.S.
I’m in NZ. Going to work (I work in a supermarket & don’t have a locker) I usually have my EFTpos card & maybe some coins to buy lunch. If I’m out & about I may also have paper money. Very few places don’t have EFTpos machines now (my son’s high school was one of the last hold outs & got a machine this year)
We still have a cheque book. My husband pays for Sky TV that way & we now pay for my son’s tennis that way after a few mix ups paying cash. But neither of us carry it around with us.
I carry them all, but I never write checks except for rent (and maybe one every two years or so for something else). I just keep my checkbook in my purse so I know where it is. It’s easier than having to search my desk and my pile of random papers and my other pile of random papers every time the first of the month comes around.