I just got a list of “funny things to do to increase your insanity” from a friend by email. One of the items on the list suggested (I’m paraphrasing here), “On the memo line of your checks write ‘For sexual favors’.” I thought this was hilarious! I told my husband that I may do this on my next check - like to the credit card or student loan companies- but he said it wasn’t a good idea. Turns out, he once jokingly wrote “For blackmail” on the memo line of a check to his mom. Her bank got really mad.
Boiled down, do banks (especially mega-big banks) read whats on the memo line of a check?
I used to work in payment processing at a bank.
Most checks go through a large machine that reads the check with an optical scanner. A small percentage are actually seen by the human eye.
You probably could get away with it. At the very least, you’ll give some humble bank employee a big laugh.
When I was in college, my father gave me a check to buy textbooks. I didn’t look at it twice, but when I tried to cash it, the cashier started laughing… turned out the memo line said, “For books, NOT BEER!!”
I don’t see why a bank would care what you wrote there…
I used to write “January Ransom Payment”, February Ransom Payment", etc on my monthly child support checks to my ex-wife. She noticed it after about a year and threw a royal fit, but she still cashed the check I never did it again and she probably still thinks that was the only time…
Several years ago, Andre Dawson was fined around $20,000 or so for throwing bats onto the field after arguing with the ump over a called third strike.
When he wrote his check out to the National League commissioner’s office, he wrote on the memo line: “Donation to the blind.” For this bit of humor, he was fined another $25,000.
I like to write little funny things in the memo part of my check if I am writing the check to a friend. My favorite was when I had to write my (older by 20 years) girlfriend a check for something or another. In the memo section I had written “Go-go lesson number 4”. She got a pretty good laugh over that one. I’ve never heard from my bank to stop doing this.
I thought this was hilarious! I told my husband that I may do this on my next check - like to the credit card or student loan companies- but he said it wasn’t a good idea. Turns out, he once jokingly wrote “For blackmail” on the memo line of a check to his mom. Her bank got really mad.
I never did it again and she probably still thinks that was the only time…