Bank no longer issues cheques
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There is a difference between faster payments and a cheque:
Cheques are based on NAME. Thus you write a cheque to your builder for £5k and write Mr F Bloggs as the payee.
FP are based on account no/sort code. Thus you pay him £5k to xx-xx-xx nnnnnnnn.
Cheques are I think less prone to error and also scamming - the papers are full of stories about people who have sent large amounts to the wrong sort code/account number.
Also the bank can stop large FP for 'security reviews' as has happened to me and also of course there is a limit for FP but not for cheques.
Cheques (especially for large amounts) are nice and slow but less error prone.0 -
Well I look forward to hearing about a new system this unnamed bank is going to set up for clubs and societies type accounts where all cheques and indeed any instructions have to be signed by two people and so there is no on-line access.
To implement an online equivalent they are going to need a system where a payment is initiated by say the Treasurer and then the other signatories log in and add their "acceptance" to the pending payment before it is finally processed and notification of success is provided back to all the signatories.
Of course this gets more complicated as the other signatories would need outside the banking system to have sight of the receiving party's bank details for them to satisfy themselves that the destination the money going to was correct prior to their 'signature' being added to the online system.
At the moment it works by me ringing up one of them and saying I have a cheque for X, can you countersign when you are next passing.....and we don't need to bother each checking X's bank details are correct.
Anyway as others have said without naming the bank this thread is pretty pointless.0 -
In a previous job I had online access to our account at NatWest (through their BankLine service). This worked on templates which were set up and authorised. Once that was done, one of my team would input the payment based on the template, pass the documentation for me to authorise.
We could also make one-off payments if required.
All in all this was considered a far better solution to issuing cheques. The statement showed to whom the funds were sent and we didn't have outstanding reconciliation issues for months. If needed we could also send a copy of the payment to the beneficiary.
This obviously has risks of fraud but no more than that of cheque issuance. Indeed, small cheques (£5k) only required one signature as against two for online.I hate verisimilitude.0 -
I never use cheques for routine payments and far prefer the Faster Payments system. That being said, I still have a cheque book on one of my current accounts because:
1. I’ve had requests from financial institutions to send them a blank voided cheque when requesting repayment of savings accounts to a current account.
2. Certain financial institutions require initial subscriptions to some of their products to be made by cheque.
Otherwise I’d happily live without a cheque book.
As others have said, it would be useful to know which bank this is.0 -
JuicyJesus wrote: »They should have been gotten rid of in 2013, as was the plan before. I don't know who this bank are but whoever they are, well done to them.
Hear Hear, Well said
All bank customers are having to pay for this out-moded system.0 -
I think the OP is mistaken.
While there may be a few UK current accounts where cheque books are no longer issued, or no longer issued unless requested, I don't believe there are any UK banks that have phased out cheques completely.
Another OP who asks a question then never returns to tell the full story then....0 -
Please name this bank that has withdrawn cheque books. I am not aware of any mainstream banks that have done this. There are far too many cheque transactions still taking place to pull out of issuing cheque books. It would be daft to do such a thing.
In my line of business, 9 out of 10 people still pay by cheque and we give them the choice. Cheques still give a very good audit trail and security for large transactions where a person may fear sending tens or hundreds of thousands of pounds via the internet. One digit wrong and those large sums going to the wrong place could cause all sorts of issues. Plus, cheques also act as a validation of the bank details. Whereas electronic payments do not.
I don't think any of us use them like we used to. However, they are stil an important method.I am an Independent Financial Adviser (IFA). The comments I make are just my opinion and are for discussion purposes only. They are not financial advice and you should not treat them as such. If you feel an area discussed may be relevant to you, then please seek advice from an Independent Financial Adviser local to you.0 -
Well I look forward to hearing about a new system this unnamed bank is going to set up for clubs and societies type accounts where all cheques and indeed any instructions have to be signed by two people and so there is no on-line access.
Lets hope it was a case of crossed-wires, perhaps it is that the bank will no longer automatically send out (replacement) cheque books, but they remain available on request? I would also imagine that a move away from cheque books would initially only impact on personal banking - the banks would be aware of organisations and businesses where a two-signature approach is taken, and still cater for them.
One aspect overlooked by the 'cheques should be scrapped' champions is that cheque payments help clubs and society administer payments they receive. Each cheque bears the name of the payer, so it is simple to work out who has paid who hasn't. Not everybody remembers to include a 'reference' when making a FP, potentially leaving the club organiser to sift through hundreds of payments (of identical amounts) to work out who has paid and who hasn't. Cash can be an even bigger headache.
The plans to scrap cheques in 2013 would have gone ahead, if it hadn't been such an ill thought out, premature, and profit motivated idea."In the future, everyone will be rich for 15 minutes"0 -
I think the OP is mistaken.
While there may be a few UK current accounts where cheque books are no longer issued, or no longer issued unless requested, I don't believe there are any UK banks that have phased out cheques completely.
Another OP who asks a question then never returns to tell the full story then....
Me too. I can't find anything online about this. If it were correct there would be more than one person on here with knowledge of it. Unless it's a really niche bank of course, in which case the solution if obvious.0
This discussion has been closed.
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