# Writing checks in the 21st century **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [January 6, 2020, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045 "2020-01-06T22:31:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Joey\_P](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/919ad9/32.png) [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/41 "2020-01-07T16:14:53Z")
> [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](#): > > While I rarely write a personal check myself, my bank’s online bill pay service will issue paper checks to any payee who does not accept electronic payment. Tend to be smaller vendors like my landscape service, pool service, etc. My pool service issues invoices via Quickbooks and I can log into Quicken and pay electronically, but that is a pain. Not sure why the online bill pay service can’t let me pay electronically through Quickbooks (possible Quickbooks is their competitor). Quickbooks and Quicken were both owned by Intuit until very recently. Also, they’re not really competitors since Quicken is for home use and Quickbooks is for running a business. There’s a very, very small amount of crossover, but it’s pretty limited to people running little tiny business (ie working from home, no employees, bringing in a few grand a year) and just need an extra hand keeping track of expenses. I would guess the reason for not being able to pay through Quicken is that they’re two different products, they just happen to have similar names. Also, Quickbooks has spent the last 5+ years trying to get as much as they can online and creating a cloud based suite of products (suite? is that right?). In any case, it makes some amount of sense that in order for anyone to do anything in that cloud, you have to be logged into their cloud. I’m not sure if that makes sense, or even if it’s correct. But it’s my guess. Of course, Intuit does a lot of things that make very little sense. So they may have just not been thinking far enough into the future to realize that a lot of businesses send bills to people that are just consumers or otherwise have no reason to own quickbooks or any other intuit product. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/42 "2020-01-07T16:23:25Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > OK, not seeing him would make cash more difficult. I try to pay people running their own small businesses with cash to make things easier on them. I know that it’s not all about me but a check is much easier for me since I don’t have to go to the ATM. There is no need to go to the bank anymore to deposit a check since I can just use my phone. If I am physically in a shop, I never write a check. I don’t even carry them with me. I always use a credit card. I totally get why a small business wouldn’t accept checks anymore and it wouldn’t annoy me at all if that was their policy. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/43 "2020-01-07T16:26:37Z")
> [@Leaffan](#): > > Actually, I’m not even sure if anyone accepts cheques here in Canada anymore; why would they? From this article (2017): > **[Why, in an age of electronic payments, do businesses still cling to using...](https://financialpost.com/entrepreneur/money/why-in-an-age-of-electronic-payments-do-businesses-still-cling-to-using-cheques)** > > They've been around since the Roman times, but efforts to change are met with resistance “Canadians write an average of three cheques each month, worth a total of $245.” “If consumers want out, why do many Canadian businesses insist on using cheques?” ---
**Author:** ![markn\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f9ae1b/32.png) [@markn\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markn_1)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/44 "2020-01-07T16:28:38Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > On a related note, I saw a post on Facebook the other day warning people not to write the year as just “20”, as it could easily be changed to another year, e.g. 6 Jan 20 could be turned into 6 Jan 2019 or 6 Jan 2021. Worth bearing in mind. I too am not seeing the danger here. I should be worried that if I write a check to someone, they might modify it in such a way that it can’t be cashed for several years? I say go for it. (Of course I know that the check date doesn’t really mean anything and postdated checks can be deposited regardless of the date, which makes this urban legend even more pointless.) ---
**Author:** ![bob\_2](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bob_2/32/3341_2.png) [@bob\_2](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bob_2)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/45 "2020-01-07T16:29:40Z")
Back in the day when I used to write cheques, the date line was always blank - I made a thing about always writing the month in full (January etc) rather and ‘/1’, but I doubt that anyone noticed. The amount was alway there twice. Once in writing - Twenty five pounds and 35 pence, and the other (where it was presumably scanned) in a box as a number 25 - 50. ''A/C Payee Only" was pre-printed across the cheque but I have doubts as to whether it had any real validity. These days most larger organisations offer a discount for paying by direct debit. Some charge extra for credit card payments and some refuse to accept cheques at all. A one-man business I deal with uses PayPal for electronic transactions but prefers cash. ---
**Author:** ![Acsenray](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/acsenray/32/4519_2.png) [@Acsenray](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acsenray)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/46 "2020-01-07T16:39:23Z")
When people talk about how obsolete paper checks are, they never mention how useful they were. You could write a check and get credit for payment knowing that it wouldn’t be cashed for several days at least. That was very important to me if my account was low in funds. I would get time to either deposit more money or expect that my paycheck would be deposited before the payee got around to depositing the check. You can’t do that with a debit card. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Librarian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/the_librarian/32/402_2.png) [@The\_Librarian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Librarian)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/47 "2020-01-07T16:51:22Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > When people talk about how obsolete paper checks are, they never mention how useful they were. You could write a check and get credit for payment knowing that it wouldn’t be cashed for several days at least. That was very important to me if my account was low in funds. I would get time to either deposit more money or expect that my paycheck would be deposited before the payee got around to depositing the check. You can’t do that with a debit card. On the flip side: Our cleaning lady can send me a text when she’s leaving our house and have the money in her account when she reaches the shop. In the dark ages that would take up to 3 “working” days, or I would have to remember to leave enough cash (the exact amount) on the kitchen table. ---
**Author:** ![Sparky812](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/eb9ed0/32.png) [@Sparky812](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sparky812)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/48 "2020-01-07T17:04:17Z")
> [@Acsenray](#): > > When people talk about how obsolete paper checks are, they never mention how useful they were. You could write a check and get credit for payment knowing that it wouldn’t be cashed for several days at least. That was very important to me if my account was low in funds. I would get time to either deposit more money or expect that my paycheck would be deposited before the payee got around to depositing the check. You can’t do that with a debit card. Yep, you could always float yourself a couple of days until your next pay cheque especially between different banking institutions. 😃 Unfortunately, thanks to computers and the internet, cheques go through much quicker if not instantaneously these days. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 5:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/49 "2020-01-07T17:35:53Z")
> [@Sparky812](#): > > Yep, you could always float yourself a couple of days until your next pay cheque especially between different banking institutions. 😃 Back when I accepted checks, that was one of my pet peeves. Someone would write a check that would bounce. The person would often be pissed off because the check was “put through too fast”. Many people would blame their bounced check on the bank. In one case that was correct! The guy brought a letter from his bank explaining that he deposited sufficient funds to cover the check, but the ATM was hit by lightning! ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 5:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/50 "2020-01-07T17:36:54Z")
> [@kayaker](#): > > Why not cash, then? Because he comes, does his thing, and leaves often without us seeing him. Every so often he leaves a bill in the mailbox. I also rarely have more than a $100 in cash in my wallet. I go through less than $1000/yr in paper money. ---
**Author:** ![FinsToTheLeft](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/finstotheleft/32/2930_2.png) [@FinsToTheLeft](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/FinsToTheLeft)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 5:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/51 "2020-01-07T17:40:31Z")
> [@Sparky812](#): > > Believe it or not, I write a lot of cheques for the kids school and/or extra-curricular activities, etc… but also for several business accounts. > > I am VP of our Little League association, on the executive for our Scouting group, the coach/manager for one of my boys hockey teams,and I was treasurer for our local community association so I have signing authority for each. Since all these organizations require 2 signatures for outgoing payments, by cheque is the only way this can be achieved. > Just last week, I was required to send a cheque and official roster through snail-mail for a hockey tournament in Nepean!? …OK, I didn’t have to mail it, but I wasn’t driving all the fucking way out to Barrhaven to drop it off 😃 The Toronto District School Board switched to SchoolCashOnline a couple of years ago. Until then, that was the single largest use of cheques I had. ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 10:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/52 "2020-01-07T22:30:46Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > From this article (2017): > [Why, in an age of electronic payments, do businesses still cling to using cheques? | Financial Post](https://business.financialpost.com/entrepreneur/money/why-in-an-age-of-electronic-payments-do-businesses-still-cling-to-using-cheques) > > “Canadians write an average of three cheques each month, worth a total of $245.” > > “If consumers want out, why do many Canadian businesses insist on using cheques?” That’s definitely more than I average in the US, for personal (non business) checks, though I might write fewer checks than US average. Again I write checks sometimes strategically. If you pay your estimated income tax, income tax balance or property tax electronically you have to put it in by the due date and it will come out of your account immediately. If you mail a check it only has to be postmarked by the due date and IME at least 7-10 day lag before they deposit it, enough for the float to be worthwhile with interest checking account for larger amounts. Otherwise I write very few personal checks anymore. And even for taxes I now usually pay by credit card through one of the electronic online services. They charge a 1.87% ‘convenience fee’ for US federal but my CC pays 2.625% cash back, plus again I don’t actually have to make that payment out of my bank account to the CC company for almost a month. But business is a different story, many though not all small business service providers to other small businesses want checks, and tenants send you checks if you rent apartments. As Joey P said, no way would a landlord accept _credit card_ payment for rent and pay the fee. If it’s a free electronic debit type payment we’d be indifferent. If somebody wants to pay rent with Venmo, fine, but nobody has ever asked to. It’s arguably logical that merchants take CC’s and pay the fees on the idea that customers will go elsewhere if they don’t, or even spend more because they are using ‘buy now, pay later’ CC. But nobody is going to turn down an apartment because they can’t pay the rent by CC, and once the rent is agreed everybody knows what’s going to be bought and paid for each month, unlike a store or flexible service provider where the customer might just buy that extra thing because they are paying with CC (do people really do that? most people think they don’t, I don’t think I do, but it seems actually many people do). ---
**Author:** ![Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/marvin_the_martian/32/2898_2.png) [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marvin_the_Martian)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 10:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/53 "2020-01-07T22:44:16Z")
> [@Joey\_P](#): > > Quickbooks and Quicken were both owned by Intuit until very recently. Also, they’re not really competitors since Quicken is for home use and Quickbooks is for running a business. There’s a very, very small amount of crossover, but it’s pretty limited to people running little tiny business (ie working from home, no employees, bringing in a few grand a year) and just need an extra hand keeping track of expenses. > > I would guess the reason for not being able to pay through Quicken is that they’re two different products, they just happen to have similar names. Also, Quickbooks has spent the last 5+ years trying to get as much as they can online and creating a cloud based suite of products (suite? is that right?). In any case, it makes some amount of sense that in order for anyone to do anything in that cloud, you have to be logged into their cloud. I’m not sure if that makes sense, or even if it’s correct. But it’s my guess. > > Of course, Intuit does a lot of things that make very little sense. So they may have just not been thinking far enough into the future to realize that a lot of businesses send bills to people that are just consumers or otherwise have no reason to own quickbooks or any other intuit product. Sorry, I mistyped Quicken for Quickbooks. I was wondering why I can’t set up ebills and electronic payments through my bank’s online payment service with a vendor who issues invoices (and can receive payments) through Quickbooks. The only way to pay this vendor is (1) through my bank’s online bill pay, in which case they send a paper check directly to him or (2) logging into Quickbooks and making an ACH payment. Most larger vendors (electric, gas, cable) I can get a bill electronically in my bank’s system and submit a payment up to the day before the due date - or better yet have automatic payment set up so I don’t have to do anything. ---
**Author:** ![HMS\_Irruncible](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hms_irruncible/32/7394_2.png) [@HMS\_Irruncible](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HMS_Irruncible)\ **Post date:** [January 7, 2020, 10:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/54 "2020-01-07T22:57:16Z")
> [@Marvin\_the\_Martian](#): > > I’ve never had personal checks with a pre-printed “19”, and I have had numerous checking accounts since 1977. Same. In fact I don’t remember many forms pre-printed with 19\_\_. But then again, maybe a faulty memory is a consequence of being born in 19\_\_. ---
**Author:** ![suranyi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/e36b37/32.png) [@suranyi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/suranyi)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2020, 2:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/55 "2020-01-08T02:10:00Z")
> [@PatrickLondon](#): > > Haven’t your banks started chivvying you all on to paperless payments yet? Cheques aren’t quite dead yet in the UK, but definitely on the way out. I definitely make the vast majority of my payments electronically, but I still use checks regularly. Here are a few reasons: 1. For my son’s extracurricular activities at school, if I need to pay for anything then I need to write a check. They aren’t set up to accept electronic payments or credit cards at all. 2. My son’s piano teacher accepts payments in cash or check. Period. 3. Many small business service providers, e.g. plumbers, will give a small discount for paying by check instead of credit card. Some still won’t take credit cards at all. Edit: I forgot the biggest reason of all: With a check, you can give someone money when all you know is their name, e.g. as a gift. ---
**Author:** ![Colophon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f05b48/32.png) [@Colophon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colophon)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2020, 10:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/56 "2020-01-08T10:03:31Z")
> [@hajario](#): > > What would be the consequence of someone modifying the date like that? Off the top of my head, if you signed some agreement to pay X amount a month “from 1/1/20”, somebody could change it to “1/1/2019” and try to claim you owed them an extra year’s worth of payments. I doubt if they’d have much luck but I presume this is the sort of thing the warning had in mind. Or if you signed a post-dated cheque for, say, six months’ time with “8 July 20”, someone could fill in “19” and cash it immediately. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2020, 12:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/57 "2020-01-08T12:01:48Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Or if you signed a post-dated cheque for, say, six months’ time with “8 July 20”, someone could fill in “19” and cash it immediately. Maybe a US/UK difference thing, but I don’t think “post dated checks/cheques” are a recognized thing in the US. Back when I accepted checks, occasionally someone would post-date a check. I did no billing, so the check was deposited when written and the bank never complained. ---
**Author:** ![MrAtoz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@MrAtoz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MrAtoz)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2020, 2:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/58 "2020-01-08T14:12:23Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Off the top of my head, if you signed some agreement to pay X amount a month “from 1/1/20”, somebody could change it to “1/1/2019” and try to claim you owed them an extra year’s worth of payments. I doubt if they’d have much luck but I presume this is the sort of thing the warning had in mind. But how often are agreements like that handwritten? If you’re talking about a lease or a loan payment schedule or something like that, those are generally typed (or more likely printed, these days). A hand-written “19” added to the date would immediately stand out as fake. It’s moot to me, since I’ve always used the full year when writing checks anyway, but this warning has struck me as somewhat dubious whenever I’ve seen it (invariably on Facebook). And I believe **kayaker** is right. Post-dating a check does you no good at all. Banks will cash them at any time, even if the date is “in the future.” At least in the U.S. ---
**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:** [January 8, 2020, 2:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/59 "2020-01-08T14:44:02Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Or if you signed a post-dated cheque for, say, six months’ time with “8 July 20”, someone could fill in “19” and cash it immediately. It’s not a good practice to post-date a check, and a post-dated check can be cashed anyway, subject to bank policy. The [Uniform Commercial Code](https://www.law.cornell.edu/ucc/4/4-401) allows a bank to process a check when presented even if it’s post-dated, subjecting the maker to bounced-check fees if the account doesn’t have sufficient funds. ---
**Author:** ![hajario](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hajario/32/171_2.png) [@hajario](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hajario)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2020, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045/60 "2020-01-08T15:03:51Z")
> [@Colophon](#): > > Off the top of my head, if you signed some agreement to pay X amount a month “from 1/1/20”, somebody could change it to “1/1/2019” and try to claim you owed them an extra year’s worth of payments. I doubt if they’d have much luck but I presume this is the sort of thing the warning had in mind. > > Or if you signed a post-dated cheque for, say, six months’ time with “8 July 20”, someone could fill in “19” and cash it immediately. Neither of those make any sense. It was just a dumb fake Facebook thing. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/writing-checks-in-the-21st-century/846045.md?page=4)