The Gaming Den

So, something noone would really like to hear.
Banks don't check/compare signatures, or information on checks anymore. if you have a check with a valid routing and account number, and there are funds in the account, the check will be honored. Even if the rest of the check is completely bogus.

They only check, when they go back and do fraud investigation.
Checks are way less secure than a debit card.

actually no, when a bank sends out canceled checks they take pictures of them and when several for the same person are lined up they can see if the signature is off. they just dont do anything about it UNLESS the account holder makes a complaint. they NEVER really checked a signature, just like credit cards that arent signed but people still use them places dont check the back of the credit card to see if the signature matches...and they never did it when you have to swipe the machine over the card that stood still to get a carbon paper imprint.

that is where the paper trail comes in that is missing form full digital payments.

Parthenon wrote:Theres an annoying thing about Firefox I've had for a while but never got around to looking into.

I used to be able to press the up and down arrows keys to scroll the page. However, some indeterminate time ago so I can't remember what changed, pressing the down key moves instantly to the bottom of the page. To actually scroll the page I have to click some text in the page at which point the vertical text cursor appears which I can move with the arrow keys. Its bullshit and frustrating and I want it to end.

Why did it change? How can I change it back? It still scrolls with the arrow keys normally in Chrome so its probably not the OS.

I'm using Firefox 10.0.2 on Mac OS 10.6 in case that affects it, but this was also happening in Firefox 8 & 9, and probably in 6 as well, as I said I can't remember.

Go to Firefox>Preferences>Advanced> uncheck the box for "Always use the cursor keys to navigate pages" then restart Firefox (it may fix it immediately, if not, restarting Firefox oughtta do ya).

For Windows users it's Tools>Options>Advanced> and the same thing.

Brilliant, that worked immediately. Thanks a lot erik. I don't know why I didn't notice that option before when I was looking through the preferences.

Fuchs wrote:You can write down your confirmation number all you want - how do you prove there was a check in the letter you sent?

Why would I have to?

Fuchs wrote:I've never had a hassle with wiring money.

I've never said it was a hassle. I said it cost a lot. From the convenience of my computer, I can wire transfer money to people all over the country (and the world), but it costs me at least $10 to do so. Compare: a stamp costs $0.44 to anyone in the country; less than $2.00 anywhere in the world.

sabs wrote:Honestly, my bank lets me pay online. I create a payee, put their name, their address, and I write them effectively a free cashier's check, which my bank mails for me, free. It is pretty damn awesome.

Yeah (but not really a cashier's check). Bill pay from your financial institution (ACH/EFT) is basically a personal check that either the bank or the recipient of your money writes [electronically] instead of you. It's becoming more and more popular for companies to offer because it has all the convenience of being online without having the costs of debit card/credit card processing. It's not instant payment, though - it takes a couple of days to clear (just like a normal check does), and different companies and banks have different policies as to when a payment counts (one of the payments I make each month debits the money from my account a few days before a payment due date so that it will clear by the payment due date, others count the time I push the 'make payment' button as the time of payment even though the company won't receive the money for another couple of days after).

Checks aren't obsolete. They're just digital. And cheap.

Fuchs wrote:People use e-bay and shop online. Do they write checks for those purchases? No. People are using electronic payments.

Tea in China? No one here is saying that because checks still serve a purpose or two that they should be the only type of payment. We're just saying that even in this awesome world of internet awesomeness - that I'm wagering all of us use - checks aren't dead yet.

RiotGear wrote:A lot of the time you can fax checks. My bank has a system where you can send them a high-res photo of a signed and validated check marked as 'delivered via internet' and they'll count it as deposited.

Mine does, too. I haven't used it yet, but they explained to me how to use it when I opened my account.

sabs wrote:Banks don't check/compare signatures, or information on checks anymore. if you have a check with a valid routing and account number, and there are funds in the account, the check will be honored. Even if the rest of the check is completely bogus.

This is entirely up to your financial institution. Some banks will totally do that. When my bank was Washington Mutual, they would call me over problems. When they became Chase, I could make checks out to the cedar tree in my yard and they wouldn't notice. The credit unions around here are pretty tough on that sort of thing, though.

sabs wrote:Checks are way less secure than a debit card.

I'm gonna say this depends on the person and the debit card. Adding those little CVC codes are another step in making cards more secure, but when you can run the direct line to your bank account as a credit card (thus requiring no PIN), you've got essentially the same "security" - does the person at the register look at your signature? And online... Who cares?

In my family, no one has ever lost money because of fraudulent check writing, but we've lost hundreds of dollars because of debit card number theft (sometimes the thieves stole the actual card, sometimes they didn't). Yeah, it gets recouped - but you have to wait a week or few while the bank investigates. It sucks.

fectin wrote:http://www.goodthink.com/writing/view_s ... &page_id=2

Ess and I received a check like that in the mail sometime in the last year. We both wondered the exact same thing as the author: what would our bank do? Crazy stuff.

Maj wrote:

Fuchs wrote:You can write down your confirmation number all you want - how do you prove there was a check in the letter you sent?

Why would I have to?

Huh? Being able to prove that you paid in time is very important in court cases.

Fuchs wrote:Huh? Being able to prove that you paid in time is very important in court cases.

If you are in court because you didn't pay something on time, it's not because your check got lost in the mail.

If I am in court because I don't want to pay interest since I paid on time, then yes, it's because my check got lost in the mail.

Fuchs wrote:If I am in court because I don't want to pay interest since I paid on time, then yes, it's because my check got lost in the mail.

Amortize the interest over all payments and compare to the wire transfer cost.

Fuchs wrote:If I am in court because I don't want to pay interest since I paid on time, then yes, it's because my check got lost in the mail.

A situation where the amount of interest from one lost check is enough to sue over is fairly ridiculous. At current interest rate, your one check would need to exceed $500,000 to even consider caring about.

Neeeek wrote:

Fuchs wrote:If I am in court because I don't want to pay interest since I paid on time, then yes, it's because my check got lost in the mail.

A situation where the amount of interest from one lost check is enough to sue over is fairly ridiculous. At current interest rate, your one check would need to exceed $500,000 to even consider caring about.

Not really. The tax office over here, as well as some of the larger firms, will forcibly collect as little as 12 dollars. Not because the 12 dollars are worth it, but because if they do have a minimal amount of money they don't go after, no one will pay such bills anymore - and that will mount up. Then there are the late fees some firms slap on bills or put into contracts, and their costs.

And if we're talking about the rent, when being late with paying can mean the owner can throw you out, it gets very important to prove you paid on time.

OK. here's what happened the last time I didn't pay a bill on time, and I wrote a check that got lost.

1) I noticed my check hadn't been cashed a week after my payment due date.

2) I called the company and asked if they received it.

3) Company says no.

4) Explanation of mailing date, check number, blah blah.

5) Company denies receiving check. Suggests that I call bank.

6) I call the bank and explain story. They suggest stop payment. We discuss fees and negotiate to zero. They stop payment on the check.

7) I call back company and explain what bank did. I give them contact info for bank so they can confirm story (if they want to). I discuss optional payment arrangements.

8) I bring new check to extension office of company that doesn't usually take payments and get a hand-written receipt that payment was delivered. No late fee charged.

This wasn't anywhere near getting to court. Going to court "over a lost check" is a ridiculously long, complicated, and painful endeavor. I do believe that legally, there has to be an effort made on the part of the payee to collect the money owed before the issue can see the inside of a courtroom. So if you haven't made contact with the people you're supposedly paying in order to make up the lost payment, the problem isn't the damn check.

As to fighting interest being charged on the lateness of the check... Most [American] businesses that I've seen are willing to assume a measure of sincerity on the part of someone who claims a lost check if their account is in good standing and they are up front about what they are doing to deal with the problem. While I'm sure that there are heartless companies out there, I have not had experience with one that actually charges money if your payment gets lost and you are quick and honest in addressing the problem.

Your lost check is a paper tiger. Unless they're giant douches in Switzerland.

So the bottom line Maj, is that if one person was nice to you, then of course it must be the case that everyone is nice to everyone else.

Guess what, you are not the only person in the world. Just because something worked out for you, does not mean it works the same way for everyone.

I spent years collecting money (working for the state), so I know what people do if they can't or won't pay in time. There are tons of people who will abuse the "Check is in the mail" excuse to buy time. And yes, there are a few landlords who would love to be able to have an excuse of "hasn't paid in time" to throw someone out, evicting someone is hard over here without reasons such as not paying rent or paying late.

I'll also have to add that going to court doesn't take that long over here, we've got a very fast system set up to collect money owed, with a first "round" before even going to court, but still going through the state.

And honestly, checks are outdated. In essence you send someone a piece of paper that tells your bank to pay him when he shows it to them. Doesn't that strike you as needlessly complicated? I simply tell my bank to pay the guy.

Kaelik wrote:So the bottom line Maj, is that if one person was nice to you, then of course it must be the case that everyone is nice to everyone else.

Guess what, you are not the only person in the world. Just because something worked out for you, does not mean it works the same way for everyone.

It has nothing to do with them being nice to her. It's they have no legal grounds to stand on. She says she sent the check on time, and when it wasn't received on time, made sure she paid anyway. Bring those fact to court, you'll just lose trying to collect interest. It'd be her word against theirs, and she acted in good faith. So she'll win. It's just how things work.

Neeeek wrote:

Kaelik wrote:So the bottom line Maj, is that if one person was nice to you, then of course it must be the case that everyone is nice to everyone else.

Guess what, you are not the only person in the world. Just because something worked out for you, does not mean it works the same way for everyone.

It has nothing to do with them being nice to her. It's they have no legal grounds to stand on. She says she sent the check on time, and when it wasn't received on time, made sure she paid anyway. Bring those fact to court, you'll just lose trying to collect interest. It'd be her word against theirs, and she acted in good faith. So she'll win. It's just how things work.

That means in the US you don't have to pay in time, you can always claim you "sent a check" but do not actually send it, and pay later. Very nice for debtors, but not nice for the rest.

Fuchs wrote: And honestly, checks are outdated. In essence you send someone a piece of paper that tells your bank to pay him when he shows it to them. Doesn't that strike you as needlessly complicated? I simply tell my bank to pay the guy.

That's retarded. Every payment requires two things: the actual transfer of wealth and the alerting of both parties that wealth has been transferred. The check provides both in a single document. If you send a document to the bank directly to tell them to transfer monies, you will not have issued instructions to the billing department you are paying to lay the fuck off. You need to either tell them directly with another document (which could have been the fucking check in the first place), or the payee has to go to the bank for confirmation that money has been paid. In either case, this is more actual documents and more total work than sending a check and having the recipient collect from the bank.

For an example of how shitty the other option is in real life: I have to pay my internet bill every month. And every month it is the same. In order to pay it here in Czechia, I need to set up a bank transfer every month. The ISP has all payments assigned an arbitrary number, which I have to put on my transfer so that they know what account it is for at the end of the month. Thus, I need to copypasta actual numbers from the bill to be able to pay them at all. And if they forget to send it to me or I lose the bill or whatever the fuck, I have to go there in person to get the number. Because merely knowing how much I fucking owe them and my account number is insufficient information to pay my fucking bill.

In a system with checks, I could just send a check for the same amount every month and be done with it. Paying bills is way fucking easier in the US than it is in Czech Republic. My wife has to physically go to the bank and fill out a transfer request every time she pays rent. And then she has to fill out another thing so that the cooperative knows that she has paid. This is bullshit.

-Username17

Frustration with cheques is in part what has led to the fascination of writing them on cows.

So what we've determined is that Switzerland is a terrible terrible place to live. (Though I already knew that). And that in America, Checks totally work, and our evil corporations tend to waive penalties if you're check gets lost on occasion (though I bet if you did this every month, they'd stop being nice)

But really
Switzerland is a horrible place to live. Check.

FrankTrollman wrote:That's retarded. Every payment requires two things: the actual transfer of wealth and the alerting of both parties that wealth has been transferred. The check provides both in a single document. If you send a document to the bank directly to tell them to transfer monies, you will not have issued instructions to the billing department you are paying to lay the fuck off. You need to either tell them directly with another document (which could have been the fucking check in the first place), or the payee has to go to the bank for confirmation that money has been paid. In either case, this is more actual documents and more total work than sending a check and having the recipient collect from the bank.

I don't need to tell anyone I paid - they receive a statement from their bank, usually daily in the case of a firm. Back when I was in billing I used to check that data - which we received on a disc. These days it's likely to be done online anyway. With checks you need to cash it in still. With wired money it's already in your account. In 20 years of paying bills I haven't had to tell any billing department even once to "lay off".

FrankTrollman wrote: For an example of how shitty the other option is in real life: I have to pay my internet bill every month. And every month it is the same. In order to pay it here in Czechia, I need to set up a bank transfer every month. The ISP has all payments assigned an arbitrary number, which I have to put on my transfer so that they know what account it is for at the end of the month. Thus, I need to copypasta actual numbers from the bill to be able to pay them at all. And if they forget to send it to me or I lose the bill or whatever the fuck, I have to go there in person to get the number. Because merely knowing how much I fucking owe them and my account number is insufficient information to pay my fucking bill.

Sounds like a Czech problem. I get all the info I need to pay on my bill, nicely formated already. I can use that to pay online, or pay at the bank or the post office, if I would like to.

FrankTrollman wrote: In a system with checks, I could just send a check for the same amount every month and be done with it.

Not really. If you can send a check, you could also simply wire money to their account, whose number shouldn't change at all. If they need a client number or reference number or whatever, then they'll need it on the check as well. I worked in billing, booking "Frank Trollmann, paid USD 100" in the right account is the same work, no matter if the money arrived electronically or by check.

FrankTrollman wrote: Paying bills is way fucking easier in the US than it is in Czech Republic. My wife has to physically go to the bank and fill out a transfer request every time she pays rent. And then she has to fill out another thing so that the cooperative knows that she has paid. This is bullshit.

This is Czech. In Switzerland, I simply set up a bank transfer to be repeated each month. That's ONE time, and good for years. I don't have to write a damn check, and mail it each month. And I don't need to fill out anything else.

Neeeek wrote:It has nothing to do with them being nice to her. It's they have no legal grounds to stand on. She says she sent the check on time, and when it wasn't received on time, made sure she paid anyway. Bring those fact to court, you'll just lose trying to collect interest. It'd be her word against theirs, and she acted in good faith. So she'll win. It's just how things work.

Umm.... what? Why the fuck would they go to court when they can just charge you more money and you have to goddam pay.

If your payment is late, there is a late fee, If you think you can win a court case to not pay that fee because your check got lost in the mail a) You are retarded, b) Winning the case will cost more than $50.

If you are late paying your electric bill, then you pay a late fee, or you have no electricity. And no, you can't go to court over $50 and force them to not charge you the late fee, you can call them and ask for them to please please please not charge you. And if you sound black or otherwise poor, you can damn bet you are still going to be charged.

We get it Neek, you are a rich person from an upper middle class family. So is Maj. But it turns out, just because people voluntarily choose not to charge you late fees doesn't mean everyone else has that option.

No one brings a court case for interest, they just charge you more money, and then you fucking pay that money or you are sent to collections, or you lose the service you are paying for.

And there is exactly nothing you can do to stop them if they want to do that.

sabs wrote:So what we've determined is that Switzerland is a terrible terrible place to live. (Though I already knew that). And that in America, Checks totally work, and our evil corporations tend to waive penalties if you're check gets lost on occasion (though I bet if you did this every month, they'd stop being nice)

Please note that I said this: ...on the part of someone who claims a lost check if their account is in good standing. You can't do this all the time, but then you don't need to, either. While the postal service here may not be perfect, it's pretty reliable.

Fuchs wrote:I worked in billing, booking "Frank Trollmann, paid USD 100" in the right account is the same work, no matter if the money arrived electronically or by check.

Yeah. But it's less work for the person sending the money, since they only have to fill out one thing and don't need any special codes or a separate statement to alert the bank and the creditor.

-Username17

With that reasoning, why the fuck would they need a late check to screw you?