Result! Together we saved the cheque

At last – some common sense. A tribute to all the people whose views are so often ignored in the name of ‘progress’, but who spoke loud and clear about how abolishing cheques was a mistake. And a sigh of relief for charities, schools and many other small organisations who rely on this form of payment.

This is fabulous news. I am a Guide Leader and receive the termly subs by cheque. I also did not feel comfortable about the thought of sending my daughter to school with large amounts of money for school trips. Excellent People Power!

I am so pleased that common sense has prevailed. Customers should be the people deciding if they want to use cheques, not Banks trying their big brother tactics. I can remember when the bank manager knew all his customers and greeted them by name, and asked if he could help when you entered his bank. Now perhaps we could return to banks looking after their customers instead of trying to dictate what they should and should not do!

Good news – I shall continue to use the cheques for my various societies activities and paying my dentist!!!

That is such great news. I can continue to send cheques to my nephew and nieces. Wonderful. Common sense has prevailed for once.

Thank God the cheque is saved. Without them my mail order business selling components to railway modellers would fold as all my customers send cheques with their orders. What we need now is for the cheque guarantee card to be replaced for when I take my stand to model railway exhibitions.
Hundreds of mail order companies would cease to exist without cheques.

Great that the cheque is saved, but some financial institutions seem to be making life harder when paying them in. I do voluntary work for a small charity and our elderly residents do not always write their cheques out accurately at the first attempt and I have to get them to correct details and initial the changes. Unfortunately, this is no longer good enough for the Nationwide who have informed me:

“If the cheque is drawn on a Nationwide account and the alteration has been initialed by the account holder we will accept it. If the cheque is drawn on another financial provider’s account, you will have to confirm with them if they are still happy to accept altered cheques and whether they have any special requirements if a cheque has been altered, initialed on front, double signature or confirmation on reverse. [how practical is this?]

The Bank of England are now leaving it to the individual banks whether to accept altered cheques or not.”

The Nationwide and BoE are obviously not trying to help either individual customers, charities or the ‘Big Society’ . Mmm!

Cheques are a convenient mechanism for payment to friends, relatives, clubs and societies where there is already a measure of trust between the parties concerned and the parties are present and from that standpoint it is good that they continue.

However, its annoying that there are still businesses that are so firmly entrenched in the nineteenth century that they will not accept payment by any means other than cheque.

I give as an example the company that I have to pay my ground rent. Yes, its a business not a private individual. The payment is exactly the same every year (for the next 15 years anyway) so standing order is the obvious and effortless way to pay it. But no, the company insists on me waiting until it has sent a demand, which I then have to remember needs paying. Then I have to find my chequebook (which I rarely use for any other purpose), write and post it together with a remittance advice, write an address on an envelope (no, they don’t even provide a return envelope), buy a stamp and finally post it. So, that has wasted the cost of two stamps and destroyed another little bit of a tree, all for absolutely no reason.

Cheques need to continue for other non-business transactions, but its high time that *businesses* however small or large were required by law to accept payment by bank transfer — which with most business banks costs less than processing cheques anyway.

I suppose I must be one of John’s “selfish parasites” but I honestly believe that no one else is subsidising my banking facilities; on the contrary . . .

I had not appreciated that businesses had abandoned the cheque and that it had “vanished”. As just one common example, the managing agents of blocks of flats are getting a constant flow of cheques from the leaseholders for service charges, ground rents, insurances etc. A host of other examples have been given in the previous Convesations around this topic.

I issue quite a number of cheques to businesses, none of which are requesting me to make payments by electronic transfer. In the last few weeks alone I have also received several cheques from businesses and the HMRC and I wouldn’t have wanted the payments in any other ways – on the day I pay each cheque in I can decide which account I wish to credit without then having to do another money transfer [which I would be necessary if I had nominated one account for all remittances]. A huge number of small shareholders receive their dividend payments in cheque or warrant form for payment into a bank account; such payments are also available electronically but many people still elect to receive and pay in a cheque and it might be because they want to pay it into a savings or oher account that they would prefer to keep private.

Surely a significant proportion of the operating costs of electronic funds processing is the amortisation of the initial capital outlay for the computers and terminals, power supplies, accommodation, secure digital connexions, and other infrastructure. I am not convinced that the return required on this investment can be dismissed as negligible.

I respect your position John. I suppose what you are saying is that people that want you to pay by cheque should make it worth your while [including reimbursement of any charges your bank makes for issuing a cheque and then clearing it, plus any postage costs] and that people who want to pay you with a cheque should compensate you for having to pay your bank to accept it [more if you pay it in at a branch] and process it through to clearing. Traditionally, in the overall scheme of things, these transactions reciprocated and it was considered preferable to abolish charges for such essential elements of banking. Now, with such differentials in the costs of the various forms of transaction [cheque, ATM, on-line, CHAPS/BACS, counter service] the relatively high unit cost of cheque processing has been highlighted leading to calls for either discontinuation or for economic charging. I think most people are worried that reintroducing charges for cheques would rapidly lead to discontinuation as the charges would surely approach prohibitive levels as demand fell away. It seems that keeping “free” cheques within the envelope of standard banking services not funded directly according to uptake is – like the universal flat-rate postal service – one of the hallmarks of our current level of civilisation.

I pay bills by credit card by preference. It helps me manage my finances. If there is a charge for using a credit card, I pay by debit card. If there is a charge for using a debit card I pay by cheque. Sometimes there is information about how to pay online, but no-one ever suggests this face-to-face.

Tradesmen often want cheques, the small companies that produce banners, posters, embroidered clothing and various other things (for a charity, if I dare mention this) all want cheques. The local branch of Kall Kwik does not take cards, and prefers me to pay by cheque for copying and producing booklets.

Dividend payments, often for only a pound or two, arrive by cheque, though I do try to ask for future payments to be made to my current account. I’ve just received a rather welcome cheque from HMRC.

I’ve noticed that organisations often make a surcharge for credit card payments, sometimes make a charge for debit card payments, but never make a charge for payment by cheque.

i need to use checks i do not trust the internet with my money or card numbers. it’s a system that has worked safley & well for years. why get rid of it.

THere is no reason why you should not use checques. But you should pay for it. At least £5 per cheque.
The rest of us use modern low cost electronic payment. Free.
Cheques are every high cost. A luxury that only a few can afford.
Why Which is proud to keep this old technolugy is beyond me. That is why I do not hav e subscription to Which. High time they got up to date.

I for one think that keeping cheques is fantastic, I’m a big fan of cheques and living in a rural area where I pay for coal, oil and other items by cheque. I can’t pay the coal man with my MasterCard or Visa he takes cheque or cash. As for the oil company last time I paid by card for oil they charged me 4 times, meaning my account went overdrawn (i have no overdraft, out of choice!) and I got charged it then took me a month to get refunded and I had to pay the mortgage with a credit card cheque. I have alot of time for cheques, I go into town two/three times per week and always take my cheque book. My community is small and we all prefer cheque!!