I normally hate fooling with banks, checks, and credit/debit cards…but life happens. I love cash and check cashing services.
My mother opened up a bank account for me 5 years ago, and I would like to start using it, but I’ve heard many horror stories about them. I may also need to cash a check at a bank that I’m not a member of.
I’m really scared that I won’t be able to cash a large check. I have three questions.
Can I cash a check at a bank that I’m not a member of?
Can I cash a check that has a larger amount than the compensating funds I have in my account. The tellers at my bank are nazis about this, I wanted to know if it is like that at all banks.
Is there a way to find out if a check has the potential to bounce, before you cash it? I have a little online part time job whose bank is located in Europe, I believe, and that kind of screws up things. Other people who have worked for this company has claimed that the checks have been known to bounce on occassion.
You can cash a check at a bank where you are not a depositor, IF the check is drawn on that bank. They will absolutely make sure that there are funds to draw it on. They won’t care how much you have in your own account.
Can I ask why you’re so afraid of banks/checks/debit cards? Instead of cashing the check, why not deposit it? It’s much, much, much safer that way. You can’t misplace money in a bank account…you can’t get mugged and have it stolen (yeah, they could take your debit card, but one phone call later and you’re safe and sound.)
I’m not saying every bank account is 100% perfect and no one ever has problems, but statistically they ARE safer than having large amounts of cash.
Banks set their own policies for cashing checks. Usually, they will only cash checks for those with accounts. This allows them to get back the money if the check is bad. Some will also cash checks if it’s drawn on them, but that’s iffy (see #3), so I doubt it’s done all that much.
Depends on the bank. But if you don’t have enough funds to cover the check, the bank doesn’t want to take the loss, so they will usually refuse to cash it. Your best solution is to deposit the check, and take out as much as you need for the next three business days. After that, the check should clear and you’ll have access to the funds.
Usually, you can contact the bank to see if the check is OK. However, the bank only knows how much money is in the account at the time you call. The account may be closed out ten minutes later, or a big check may come in that would lower the amount in the account.
Why do you love giving your money to parasites? Check cashing services charge obscene fees.
Why would you need to? Doesn’t your account come with an ATM card?
It’s like that at all banks. They have to make the first $100 of the deposit available immediately, but depending on the amount of the check and where it’s from, there will be some number of days after which the rest will be available. The last time I deposited a check, the deposit receipt had a note saying what date the funds would be released.
If you can figure this one out, the banking industry would love to hire you. Seriously. We can score a check based on factors like personal vs business account, geographic distance of the check writer, etc., but we still don’t have a good way to confirm that funds will actually be available at the time the check is presented to the writer’s bank.
I was wondering about that; the OP has “heard many horror stories about” banks but loves check cashing services (which generally charge larger fees than banks)?
I’m also confused by the fear of banks. Banks do not exist to rip you off or cheat you through fine print. Any bank that operated in such a fashion would quickly gain a hideous reputation and lose all customers.
Check cashing operations, OTOH, do exist to rip you off and prey on those who can’t get bank accounts- for example illegal aliens, and those with hideous credit.
I just have trust issues, I can say. I don’t trust human beings, or worse, machines handling my money.
The horror stories I’ve heard mostly involve “bad checks”. Checks that bounce that force customers to pay hundreds of dollars or even having their accounts frozen. I even heard of two stories of security being contacted because the tellers didn’t like the look of the checks that were trying to be cashed.
I think that some of the posters here are not making a key distinction.
[ol]
[li]If you have a check drawn on XYZ Bank and take it to XYZ Bank, they will cash it if there are funds in the person’s account that wrote the check to you.[/li][li]If you have a check from XYZ Bank and take it to your bank (not XYZ Bank) they will cash it while putting a hold on that amount of your deposited funds.[/li][/ol]
Yeah, that’s pretty ridiculous. Banks handle billions and billions of dollars every day and are well-established as pretty much the most trusted type of institution you’re ever going to find. Nothing is ever 100%, but that’s just life.
And what does the “check-cashing place” you go to (next to the WIC and bail bonds places I assume) do about bad checks? I guess they’re happy to accept fraudulent or overdrawn checks and pay them out in cash?
To the average bank, you’re such small potatoes that you’re, literally, unnoticeable. I mean that in the nicest possible way: banks are doing billions of dollars’ worth of business each year - you really think they’re after your coupla bucks?
You live in a society, one that uses money in all its forms to operate. That means to function in society, then either a machine or a human will, at some point, be “handling” your dough. (You trust yourself, right? Are you a human? How come other humans aren’t trustworthy but YOU are?)
I don’t know about it not being “done all that much” - most banks WILL cash such a check, and immediately debit the account it’s drawn on. However, a lot of banks have started charging fees for that, which I think is completely lousy. It falls in (in my mind) with banks wanting to charge customers who use tellers vs. electronic transactions (ATM etc.) - only they’re not charging customers this so there isn’t as much screaming. They’re charging non-customers, whose business they don’t care about. But anyway - if you cash your check at the bank it’s drawn on, you know it’s good.
Jumping on the bandwagon with “check cashing places? WHY???”. If you don’t need an account for any other purpose, you can get one to allow you to deposit checks and withdraw (a day or two later) the cash. Using a check cashing service, unless you absolutely have no alternative, is just flushing money down the toilet. If you like doing that, PM me and I’ll suggest an alternate place to send it :D.
