I miss paying by check

[Vince in Milwaukee]

My direct deposit hit my account today. I went online and attempted to pay my car insurance bill with my debit card (cheaper rate that way).  Their site said my #s were not valid.   ???  WTH.  Looks like I will be giving them a call tomorrow.  Am I a technologically inept Ludite who hates new things, or was the old way better?  I know that computers and tech are the way of the future, but sometimes this $h!t is just a PIA!    

[rocker59]

I still pay our utility bills with checks.  Also, my car/bike insurance.

Otherwise, it's cash or card.

And, it's amazing how much I use a card compared to just ten years ago.

Everything changes, I guess.

[mgfan]

Did some volunteering before Christmas, manning a kettle to collect donations. Nobody has coins anymore!   :-\ :BEER:

[WP2]

I haven't had a checkbook since 2001 - no issues. No idea how much I've saved on stamps, envelopes, etc. Prolly enough for at least a couple beers...

[mach1mustang351]

I work in retail and I hate checks.  They take longer to fill out than swiping the card (others in line get upset) and most of them are scams unfortunately.  I get probably 5 retail checks a week and at the end of the month probably 30% come back NSF, fraudulent, stolen etc... big pain.   

[trippah]

One of the less known or appreciated aspects of direct deposit was showcased (by mistake) in the December direct deposit pay for a local school system.  apparently the code was a bit off and they deducted from everyone's banking account the amount of their pay rather than crediting the accounts.  It was quite a red faced Santa when everyone lost two months of pay just as they hit the stores for Xmas shopping.  New may not always be better. ;D

[Wayne Orwig]

We still use checks for utility bills. Too many of them want to eliminate the paper statements when the go electronic. Sorry, when I am standing in front of them pointing out their obvious error, I want printed documentation showing them their problem.

[Lannis]

We still use checks for utility bills. Too many of them want to eliminate the paper statements when the go electronic. Sorry, when I am standing in front of them pointing out their obvious error, I want printed documentation showing them their problem.

Don't use checks for anything any more except church and other donations.

Everything else is automatic deductions, automatic bill-pay from the account, direct debit, or Paypal.   Insurance bills, taxes, utilities, everything just comes straight out of the account.  I won't even stop in a gas station that doesn't have pay-at-the-pump.   Hate standing in line behind all the ticket-scratchers trying to give them my money .... !

Lannis

[dilligaf]

You pay Joe Eish by check.   ;-T  He ships your parts along with the bill. By todays standards, about as old fashion as you can get. And trusting your customers to pay.  Now that is old fashion.   :BEER: Matt

[centauro]

Using checks is pretty much like having a points plate (Guzzi content) when you have a Dyna system on your older bike....
You never know when you need one.

Happy New Year!

[Sportsterleroy]

You pay Joe Eish by check.   ;-T  He ships your parts along with the bill. By todays standards, about as old fashion as you can get. And trusting your customers to pay.  Now that is old fashion.   :BEER: Matt

 I would get parts from Joe or Ida May and set the bill on the table. About a week later I would think, "Did I pay this" and sent a second check. We all know Ida May has no Accounting set up for credits, so she was not a happy camper when I did that.

    I now have Eish set up in my checking acct in Bill Payer like the gas bill.  Grab the bill and find his name imput the amount and use the computer as soon as I get it.

Leroy in Cleveland

[Sheepdog]

Yeah, I really miss trying to figure out how much cash I needed for the weekend and waiting in a long line at the bank after work on friday to get it...NOT!

[Caffeineo]

I try to use a cash back credit card for everything. Used to go to the ATM and get cash to pay for stuff but figured I could get a small % back by using the CC. After the first year I got just over $300 and they sent me an offer for a 5% CC. Of course this only works if you pay in full every month.  ;D

[Mark West]

I don't miss writing checks one bit but still like to get paper bills as they are just a lot easier for me to read and check. I just pay them with the bill pay feature at my bank. Once you set up a payee, its about as easy as checking email. You can even have them send a check to people or companies that don't take credit cards like a private contractor, babysitter, or whatever.

One thing I don't do is give a company my credit card for auto paying anything. Wife did that with the phone company and all of a sudden, we started getting a lot of incorrect charges; each one requiring a lot of phone time to get rid of. Naturally they make it a royal PITA to get rid of that feature. Once we did the billing errors seemed to go away. Coincidence?

[donn]

Checks might be coming back, ever so slightly anyway.  A few years ago I thought a checkbook was going to be an anachronism like typewriters etc., but ... for example, at the band instrument repair place around the corner, they'll suggest that a check would be nice.  Because whatever the risk of it bouncing, that's apparently worth it in light of how much the finance companies eat out of your revenue when you take a card.

When I have a large grocery haul at the food co-op, I tear out a blank check.  They run it through a little scanner/printer gizmo that fills it out and records it, and hand it back to me, and I sign in the same gizmo that I would have with a card.  Faster than cash, and no percentage cut to the finance companies.

[andrewdonald1]

DO NOT USE YOUR DEBIT CARD for anything other than withdrawal of money from your native bank.

Hacking is getting much much worse now - Almost any vendor is fair game now.

I would suggest using credit cards and pay them off every month.

Or electronic bill pay using your bank.  That's about it. 

Even paper checks are risky now.

[dilligaf]

The only thing I use my Debit Card for is to withdraw money from my account when the bank is closed. This is the only place I use my Debit Card.   If the bank is open I always go inside to do my transactions.  Anything else is cash or Credit Card.  :BEER:
Matt

[Lannis]

DO NOT USE YOUR DEBIT CARD for anything other than withdrawal of money from your native bank.

Hacking is getting much much worse now - Almost any vendor is fair game now.

I would suggest using credit cards and pay them off every month.

Or electronic bill pay using your bank.  That's about it.  

Even paper checks are risky now.

I've simplified my life a bit this year and just use my debit card for everything.   I have a credit card I use if I have to, and I try to carry $100 cash or so just in case, but everything else is the debit card.   The bank's on-line accounting is pretty good, the debits show up instantly.

I'm with the guys who don't see the point in waiting in bank lobbies, waiting in convenience store lines, balancing check books, and all that.   Might as well take advantage of what good there is in this modern technology; Lord knows that much of it is no use to me ....

Lannis

[LowRyter]

speak of the Devil.  The wife was on the phone for 30 minutes with the City Utility Billing Dept.   They changed their pay site to 3rd party provider, all our account numbers were changed.  She had to re-register everything.

Anyway, I buy everything on my credit card where I get 1% cash back.  You have to pay the nut every month.

[Howard R]

I've simplified my life a bit this year and just use my debit card for everything.

You do know that anything that hits the debit card instantly comes straight out of your checking account, don't you?  WHEN that card gets hijacked you'll have to deal with the fallout.  (BTDT, to the tune of $1200.  I did get it all back eventually but it was a PITA, and I'm very lucky that I didn't have checks ricocheting all over town in the interim.)  Most banks will give you a no-fee credit card that is separated from your checking account, that's what I did after the unpleasant lesson.  Further, since the interweb is pretty much the root of all evil-doers who steal CC numbers, I also got a "disposable" CC that only gets used on-line (and is the ONLY one that gets used on-line) with a $500 credit limit to sort of limit the carnage.  It's been replaced a couple of times now.

Howard

[andrewdonald1]

You do know that anything that hits the debit card instantly comes straight out of your checking account, don't you?  WHEN that card gets hijacked you'll have to deal with the fallout. 

Exactly.  Use the credit companies like they use us.  By law if you object to a charge they have to do their thing.
They are in fact motivated to stop fraudulent charges VERY QUICKLY, in fact you have someone monitoring your accounts for free (well nothings free) unlike a debit card.

This is much different than your DEBIT card - that is direct withdrawal and their is no law that the banks have to do anything that I know of, consequently they are not very motivated.

I learned the hard way on this one, thank god the loss's were small.

White collar crime (in this discussion as hacking) is ramped, do yourself a favor and DO NOT use your debit card unless at your native bank.

Ok, that's all I am going to say on the matter.
 

[Lannis]

You do know that anything that hits the debit card instantly comes straight out of your checking account, don't you?  WHEN that card gets hijacked you'll have to deal with the fallout.  (BTDT, to the tune of $1200.  I did get it all back eventually but it was a PITA, and I'm very lucky that I didn't have checks ricocheting all over town in the interim.)  Most banks will give you a no-fee credit card that is separated from your checking account, that's what I did after the unpleasant lesson.  Further, since the interweb is pretty much the root of all evil-doers who steal CC numbers, I also got a "disposable" CC that only gets used on-line (and is the ONLY one that gets used on-line) with a $500 credit limit to sort of limit the carnage.  It's been replaced a couple of times now.

Howard

Howard -

This is where my mantra of "By the Time you are Our Age, you Should Know Your Lawyer, your Doctor, your Financial Advisor, and your Banker PERSONALLY!" comes in VERY handy.

I do know them all personally, which means I don't have to seek information on the Internet if I'm feeling bad, getting sued, need more retirement income, or get scammed for money in the bank.

I do a lot of automatic bill payment, Internet purchasing, PayPal-ing, international traveling, and I don't know what all.   Everybody and his dog has my card numbers.

My credit card has been scammed once, after a trip to the UK.   Someone in Milton Keynes hit the card for $1100 to buy some sort of Internet service.   One call to the bank - "Carolyn, have a look at my card account.   Transaction XYZ isn't mine, it's a scam."   "No problem, come on down to the bank and sign the form ...." and when I did, the transaction disappeared.

After ANOTHER trip to the UK in 2009, my debit card got hit for $2,500.   Came right out of my primary checking account.   One call to the bank - "Carolyn, have a look at my account ending in 0804.   That $2500 transaction isn't mine, it's a scam."   "No problem, come on down to the bank and sign a form ...."  and when I did, the money was back in my account THE SAME DAY.

So I'm just not very scared about being scammed, I guess.   It's not only low-probability (one in THOUSANDS of transactions), but it's low-consequence too, as I've experienced.   

DON'T let the people who handle your business be faceless strangers at the other end of an 800 number.   That leads only to pain and heartache.   Be smart about who you do business with .... !!

Works for me!

Lannis

[charlie b]

We've had the same kind of service from our 'no name' bank service dept.  And, we didn't even have to go in and sign anything.  Just took care of it over the phone (when they called me to check on the strange charges).

We have one creedit card we use on line, we use the debit card for a lot of stuff, but not on line.  Haven't lost the use of our funds.  Have had both cancelped and reissued several times.

FWIW I've had an AMEX card for many years.   Have not had to have it reissued and have only had one fraudulent charge in more than 15 years of steady use, both online and in all types of stores.

[toma nova]

We've had the same kind of service from our 'no name' bank service dept.  And, we didn't even have to go in and sign anything.  Just took care of it over the phone (when they called me to check on the strange charges).

We have one creedit card we use on line, we use the debit card for a lot of stuff, but not on line.  Haven't lost the use of our funds.  Have had both cancelped and reissued several times.

FWIW I've had an AMEX card for many years.   Have not had to have it reissued and have only had one fraudulent charge in more than 15 years of steady use, both online and in all types of stores.

Same experience here - a couple of fraudulent charges over the past 15+ years, all resolved over the phone with no loss to us.

Amex (work and personal) - hundreds (maybe thousands?) of charges around the world, including many 2nd and 3rd world countries, not one fraudulent charge, cards never replaced.
Citibank MC - replaced 4-5 times in 6 years from three scams in Costa Rica and the US - dropped them.
Chase Visa - no scams in 4 years but very little use
Discover - card replaced 2 or 3 times in 4 years as a precaution, still our daily card for local and internet use

When we lived in Japan, it was mostly cash - I was withdrawing $500 at a time, seems like every week!  We've started doing more cash at restaurants so our card is not out of our sight.

Tom

[redrider90]

You pay Joe Eish by check.   ;-T  He ships your parts along with the bill. By todays standards, about as old fashion as you can get. And trusting your customers to pay.  Now that is old fashion.   :BEER: Matt

We have a old timey hardware store in town that is cash/check only. You order something from them and they put it down on a 3X5 index card stored in a metal file box. No computer in that store. When you cannot find something you ask and they know where it is every time. Stuff is all over the place helter-skelter. Most modern things they have are metric nuts and bolts and some led bulbs!
Joe Eish is the last of his kind in the MC world.

[Kiwi_Roy]

The government is trying to talk me into paying taxes by computer.
When I give them a check it typically takes them 2-3 weeks to process it, why would I want to give them the money up front?

[Lannis]

Cash is always faster , all of this plastic money is costing consumers and retailers tons of money every year , and is a legal scam . Who pays for those fraudulent charges that magically disappear , surprise , it isn't the banks . Sorry , every electronic plastic transaction is just one more layer of cash skimming middleman added to the economy .

  Dusty

That's true.   Although you could change "Skimming Middleman" into "Providers of Convenience" and it would still be true.   

For me, it's a matter of rejecting those aspects of modern convenience and technology that do NOT have a "return" to me for what they cost (cell/smart phones, GPS technology, eBay snipers, etc), but using the parts that DO have a return to me (being able to buy gas at night without standing in line to pay, instantly ordering up something on the Internet I want, not having to sit down with paper bills and balance checkbooks), recognizing that the use of these things adds some amount to what I'm paying.

If people like me didn't use those services, they'd disappear.   MY convenience, of course - I don't answer phone calls from people I don't know, EXEDE filters out all the spam emails, and I never pay a penny in interest .....

Lannis

[redrider90]

Cash is always faster , all of this plastic money is costing consumers and retailers tons of money every year , and is a legal scam . Who pays for those fraudulent charges that magically disappear , surprise , it isn't the banks . Sorry , every electronic plastic transaction is just one more layer of cash skimming middleman added to the economy .

  Dusty

Quite true Dusty. We pay cash/check locally; but buying online there is only one choice.... plastic. And everybody pays more for it in the end: except the banks.
I do not take credit cards nor health insurance in my small orthotics medical practice. Since 2001 I have had only a few checks bounce.

[LowRyter]

hard to beat Discover Card 1% cash back + free loan float for billing cycle. 

Yes, all consumers pay for those of us that benefit.

[Lannis]

Quite true Dusty. We pay cash/check locally; but buying online there is only one choice.... plastic. And everybody pays more for it in the end: except the banks.
I do not take credit cards nor health insurance in my small orthotics medical practice. Since 2001 I have had only a few checks bounce.

Speaking of bouncing checks, a lot of the little convenience stores around here have a "Wall of Shame" where they tack up "bounced checks" that people skipped out on and never paid.   I'm wondering (A) whether that ever did any good and (B) if some pro-bono lawyer might not start a lawsuit over "privacy" if he took a notion.  Me, I think it's pretty interesting to see who stole something from the store!!

I do pay my local chiropractor in cash.  

Lannis