Seriously, Who the Heck Still Write Checks These days?
Posted by Cap in Even More Ramblings on May 4, 2007 |I’m trying to clean out my desk (trying is the keyword here), and I noticed a dust covered box. As I brush off the dust, dead ants, and opened the box, I was presented with stacks of checkbooks. Yay.
These stack of check book came about from one of my pettier moments in life. When I stopped working for Bank of America years ago, I requested stacks of free checkbooks because my Prima account would soon be switched to a regular checking account (you get free checkbooks with the Prima account).
The ironic and stupid part is that, I should have known better than to request these checkbooks — after all, the very reason why I stopped working at Bank of America was because they closed down the Brea processing center due to the lower volume of check writings people do.
But seriously, who the heck still write checks these days?
The last time I wrote a check was years —
Well never mind. It was just yesterday, at the Santa Clarita courthouse, where I wrote a check for $39 so I can attend an 8-hour “home study” traffic school. Double yay.
P.S. In other situations where I have to write a check, I’ll use my checking account’s bill pay feature and let the bank do the postage mailing. 39 cent savings = hot.
26 Responses to “Seriously, Who the Heck Still Write Checks These days?”
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May 4th, 2007 at 5:42 pm
I’ll tell ya who! People who are in front of me at the grocery store! Those finks!
May 4th, 2007 at 6:02 pm
ahaha. that is true. I’m starting to embrace self-check out lines a lot more now.
May 4th, 2007 at 8:56 pm
Much to my chagrin when I go shopping with her, my mother uses checks. She won’t use a debit card because a. you still need to keep a register and b. she thinks the stores just want their hands on your money faster (faster than they’d get it with a check).
May 4th, 2007 at 9:04 pm
I mostly stopped writing checks a few years ago being ahead of the game with online transactions. But I am still not checkfree in two payments:
Rent: How can I? Cash is out. Automatic deducation I do not want. Credit cards are a $20 additional fee.
Xcel Energy: The most difficult utility company I have dealt with. Cannot sign up for online billing as I am forced to use mycheckfree.com. Either it’s a fee for the Credit Card, a social security number needed, talking to a rep for my bank account…always a problem. They reluctantly get a check.
After ordering checks online I get the same email about every month. “Our records indicate you may be running low and we don’t want you to pay rush delivery to repliensh.” Yeah right, I still have 500 checks cause you made me buy 800 per purchase.
May 4th, 2007 at 9:08 pm
Hey Kat -
Not trying to attack your mom but she sounds way old school and behind times! Merchants can cash and get funds faster than ever with checks these days. You just can’t float or expect to keep the funds for a few days like in times past.
And who uses a checkbook anymore? Using a combo of credit and debit I found it too annoying to balance it after every purchase. However I do have financial self-discipline and log into my banking online every 3rd day or so…
May 4th, 2007 at 11:45 pm
I use a debit card and cash for most purchases but I use checks from a checkbook for paying rent, utilities, credit card payments, and making DRP deposits. Yeah, I’m a control freak! But a check’s a financial tool. Dissing checks is a bit like dissing a hammer when there are nail guns.
May 5th, 2007 at 1:03 am
Bill Pay was probably the 2nd biggest thing that got rid of checks after credit/debit cards. Most utilities and recurring home stuff had to be sent by a check but now that most banks have bill pay, no more needing a check. Only time I use check is to pay for a ticket like you ;)
May 5th, 2007 at 5:36 am
I pay my rent by check, too. And there are the occasional donations - somebody’s always racing to cure something, it seems.
May 5th, 2007 at 1:24 pm
I write checks for rent and for the offering at church, but that’s about it nowadays.
May 5th, 2007 at 2:48 pm
The people I know who still write checks are people whose names I see in the newspaper who will have warrants out for them soon for writing bad checks!
May 5th, 2007 at 4:03 pm
Just FYI (since you mentioned your traffic school cost), you do not have to ever step foot in a courthouse to deal with a traffic ticket (at least here in LA). In the past 3 years I have been zinged twice, once by radar (CHP) and once by laser (local cop). I have not gone to any court in person for either. For ticket no. 1 I did what is called a “trial by written declaration.” Short story is that you essentially write a letter explaining why you are not guilty. Mine worked and I was acquitted. Last year I got a ticket by a motorcycle cop using laser — a little harder to fight because of the technical differences, so I just decided to do traffic school (LA County). You can deal with the whole thing via the LA Court’s website (lasuperiorcourt.org), and then do traffic school online as well. You still have to pay the usual BS fees as well as the fine, but at least you don’t need to go to a filthy courthouse and deal with the usual smirking clerts and sheriff’s deputies.
———-
Thanks for the suggestion Pete. I knew about the website and definitely knew about the trial by written declaration (TBD) method too. they made it even easier to go that route by letting you request it on the lasuperiorcourt site. Basically in short, I fought it via TBD. Lost the TBD and traffic school was not mentioned/granted. So I had to request for a 2nd trial, trial de novo.
After extending that 2nd trial to a later date since I had an exam on the same day… my citing CHP officer was there on the day of the court. At that point I just wanted traffic school to avoid the points, and the judge basically told us before any of the cases begins that.. if he finds us guilty, he won’t grant us traffic school. Technically he can, but he doesn’t have to and he wont. One guy decided to fight anyway and lost, and the judge kept his word and didn’t grant him traffic school.
Traffic school was exactly what I wanted, so I simply went the no contest route. Which is a bit silly because I could have just went that route from the beginning and avoided the 2-4 hr drive up and down, but yeah.. had two shots at getting this dismissed but both didn’t really go through. Oh well.
FYI to anyone getting a citation in the Santa Clarita district… consider TBD carefully. I wrote up a fairly well written one (in my opinion anyway) but still lost it. The judge was pretty strict in the sense that he won’t be granting traffic school too. In fact, he even told me that in most instance he won’t grant traffic school to people doing trial de novo (even though law doesn’t say he can’t.. but as he said, he doesn’t have to). Overall he seemed fair though (he did give us a warning ahead of time), and they don’t seem to screw around really. There was a few lucky people that didn’t have their citing officer present, so the judge immediately dismissed those people’s case.
For my first traffic ticket, this was more hassle than I’d like to deal with.. but I learned a few things. $195 was worth it to fight, I think. Too bad it didn’t pan out!
May 5th, 2007 at 5:37 pm
We use checks for church donations and other odds and ends that come up. For example, my husband traveled with his brother a couple of months ago and owed him $110 for hotel reimbursement. Wrote him a check (that he still hasn’t cashed… grrr…).
I use a checkbook even though all the bills get paid online. Otherwise, I’d just be trusting that the bank doesn’t make any mistakes, and that would be foolish. It’s also faster to see how much money we have (if wanting to make an ATM withdrawal) if it’s on paper, rather than getting to the website.
May 5th, 2007 at 9:40 pm
I use checks for my utilities, which don’t have any other payment method, and for gas, which supposedly has online payment but it didn’t work the first few times I tried it and they charged me late charges, so I don’t trust them. My credit union charges for online payment.
I also use checks to pay for dance classes at a nonprofit organization. And my roommate writes me a check for his half of the rent and utilities each month.
I still use a checkbook, but I added in extra columns for my two credit cards. So I can still keep track of where everything is as I make purchases, just like in the olden days.
May 6th, 2007 at 2:36 pm
I write about 4 checks per month… 1 to the baby sitter, 1 to the gym, and 2 more to … well, somebody!
(Of course, I use a LOT of cash…)
NCN
May 6th, 2007 at 3:13 pm
I mostly use cheques for sending money to friends and family in Canada (I get free use of cheques, so they are cheaper then a Money Order), and to pay club dues by mail. I myself, prefer paying rent by automatic withdrawal then by any other way, that way I just have to make sure money is in bank- I always keep a ‘float’ in there so that there is always the funds in the bank at the time. I don’t think cheques are completely obsolete, yet.
Oh! I also transfer money over from one account to another by depositing a cheque into a bank machine- 2 different banking corporations…
May 7th, 2007 at 9:10 am
I only write one check a month for rent. I’m glad I don’t have to mail out checks anymore.
May 7th, 2007 at 9:12 am
I try not to use checks. However, I still have to write a check for rent and my car payment. I only do those becuase it’s not possible for the former and a ten dollar charge for the latter. I find if I pay through the net I am much more faithful about payments.
May 7th, 2007 at 1:08 pm
I write them for health insurance and rent. The ones I write to AAA though, they just scan and hand right back. I’m sure that confuses some people the first time through.
May 7th, 2007 at 2:44 pm
I think the only thing I use a check for these days is to send money for pictures,yearbook, or other school related costs with my daughter in Kindergarten. They accept credit cards but you have to write your number on the little envelope and send that with them and that just doesn’t feel very safe to me. Other than that it’s bank bill pay & check card all the way!
May 8th, 2007 at 5:03 am
I write checks for any payment that I might need to show proof of, real estate tax, real estate insurance payments, charitable giving, etc. If I need to prove I made the payment (either to the IRS or to the bank that holds my mortgage) I use a good old fashioned check.
May 8th, 2007 at 10:21 pm
I officially stopped writing checks when I got an additional checking account through ING last month. I only write checks for rent (usually), but I trust ING more than I trust Bank of America (my first checking account) to mail my check payments for me.
But of course, I brilliantly decided to do all of this right AFTER I re-ordered my BoA checks. So now I have a $24 stack of pretty checks that will probably never be used. Sigh…
May 10th, 2007 at 4:37 am
Quite a few people pointed out rent and church donations, and the latter is definitely something I didn’t think of.
I certainly don’t like dropping cash into the basket.
Either way, lot’s of good examples. I suppose they definitely won’t go away anytime soon. And in instances where it’s writing credit card # down to strangers (such as school related stuff as mentioned by Anonymous), I guess a check wouldn’t be so bad. (Although all the information they need to access your checking is there too, such as address, routing #, account #. woot!)
Elissa: transfer the funds back to Bank of America and sign away! I’ll take a blank check or two or three :)
May 11th, 2007 at 11:11 am
Here’s two more uses:
When you put business expenses on a personal credit card, you need to prove that you paid those expenses with a cancelled check or a copy of one.
You should pay medical bills (especially copays, or things where you haven’t yet met your deductible) with checks because your insurance company will want proof of the expenses later.
June 1st, 2007 at 5:52 pm
I still use checks for any bill that can’t be paid electronically - in my book having the credit union pay for the postage is abusing the system. Judging from the comments above I guess plenty of people are - too bad for all of us when the credit unions and banks that don’t currently havet to start charging for the service. I also pay with checks all the time in stores and don’t patronize stores that don’t take checks. Credit card charges to merchants raise prices for everyone. And for those that moan and groan about people in front of them writing a check believe me I’m behind you cursing when you’re using a credit card at the convenience store.
June 14th, 2007 at 11:45 am
The only thing I ever use checks for is paying rent (everything else is paid for online or through credit/debit card), and I’m sure that once my apartment starts accepting credit cards, I’ll never even touch my checkbook.
Unfortunately, I have an addiction to buying checkbooks in different designs, just because.