Who writes checks these days? I hardly ever do anymore - mostly because of the time it takes and because of the safety risk of putting my bank routing number, account number, and address out into the retailing wilds to fend for themselves. I usually use a pre-load debit card to stay on a monthly shopping budget.
However, in the last few days I've needed to take various youngsters back-to-school shopping. That falls outside the normal budget, and my money hadn't gotten to the debit card account yet.
"Fine," I thought. People used to write checks. I used to write checks. I think I can still remember how to write one. So writing checks for back to school expenditures was the plan.
Shopped at Shoe Carnival on Wednesday. Wrote a check. Some other place I don't remember took my check. Britt PTA took my check. But on Thursday, I wrote a check to PacSun for my daughter's jeans. Then we headed over to DSW Shoe Warehouse. [Buzzer sounds] Nope - they would not take my check. What?!? I have the money in the account to cover it. A thousand scenarios of what-could-be-the-problem fly through my brain.
Wait, I know I have the money in that account. Could someone have used the routing number & bank information and drained our account? The clerk at DSW asks me if I've written checks recently. "Sure I have," I said, "but I wouldn't say excessive." The clerk explained that the system looks for several checks written in a short period of time, and will flag and decline checks as a fraud prevention measure. So even if I had $75,000 in that account, it wouldn't make a difference. They wouldn't take my check.
I'm not worked up that I can't write checks. The staff at DSW was really nice about it, and took the time to talk to me about it. A check is just a note that's a promise to pay. I suppose it's a good thing to not write them.
But what about people who just want to have a checkbook to use instead of cash, and they'd like to keep their lives simple? It's very hard to "stay simple," even the checks are now run electronically. I remember when people used to be able to count on a little "float" time - the period of time in between when you write a check and when it actually cleared. A lot of people became accustomed to using that system as sort of a free loan. It's been electronic now for a few years. There is no "float" time anymore.
Our world is now instant. Is all this a good thing or a bad thing, in your opinion?
