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Do You Still Use Checks?



Just curious, as I was at a grocery store recently and an old person was paying with a check (cheque?) and the other people in line got all fussy because of it and were quite critical of this elderly person for paying with what was once a perfectly acceptable format for exchanging money. The thing that struck me about the whole event is that I didn’t actually have anywhere to be, so it didn’t matter to me whatsoever if this old person took an extra two minutes to fill out a check. I just don’t see why the rest of the world is in such a damn rush all the time now about everything. I feel like I’ve gained about 40 or 50 years age in the past year though, so who knows. If you still use checks, where and how do you use them?







11 Reader Responses

  1. Julia Says:
    January 28th, 2008 at 5:24 pm

    I still use checks but I don’t carry them with me so I can’t use them for groceries etc. For me using checks is a way to slow myself down and pay attention to where I’m spending my money. It’s like a twice monthly money ritual and it’s about the only thing that gives me a feel for what people who use rituals get from it. Getting cash out of an ATM or cashing my paycheck aren’t slow enough to get me to focus. Using your debit card for spur of the moment purchases just gives you a lot of fees to track down too.

  2. Cfraser Says:
    January 28th, 2008 at 7:40 pm

    I’ve seen people of all ages using cheques.

    I”m of two minds about the ‘making people wait and slowing down’ thing. First I try to respect our elders. I figure if someone has made it 70+ years they deserve some form of respect from me, even if that’s just me adding a little more patience to my focus - although I’m a pretty laid-back guy in the first place.

    So I can respect an older person using a cheque, as it’s something that they are used to and we shouldn’t demand that they change their habits suit society, unless their habits are a danger to society (i.e. driving a vehicle)

    On the other hand a person writing a cheque IS being inconsiderate of everyone else in line. Whether we should slow down and take our time and not get stressed about having to wait is fine (and I agree people do need to slow down and relax more) but when someone else’s behaviour removes from me the choice of weather or not I want to ’slow down’ or ‘get moving’ as I want, then they are affecting me.

  3. cadeveo Says:
    January 28th, 2008 at 11:58 pm

    Still use checks!

    I use them to pay bills. I trust them, for some reason, much more than paying bills on line. (Buying books, on the other hand, I do online…)

    Maybe it’s also because it’s sort of a ritual I have to truly think about. Filling it in, deciding how much to pay on a bill (if it’s something I can’t pay off all at once), plus I rather enjoy my little ritual of writing snarky shit in the section where you do the long-hand of the amount you’re giving. It’s usually stuff along the lines of:

    “Forty three fanciful dollars and twenty seven fiat pennies”

    I’m waiting for the day when they don’t cash the check because of the way I’ve written the amount, but of course, I don’t think that’ll ever happen. Which sort of proves my silly little point!

    Also something about having to sign your signature to a check that appeals to me. I’ve got to basically say, I approve of this (monetary) sacrifice and am willing to put my name on it.

  4. Tim Boucher Says:
    January 29th, 2008 at 12:06 am

    A friend of mine, his GF will often sign his check at restaurants, and she will just write some totally hilarious name with drawings of unicorns and butterflies and hearts around the signature itself.

  5. Aaron Says:
    January 29th, 2008 at 2:29 am

    Also something about having to sign your signature to a check that appeals to me. I’ve got to basically say, I approve of this (monetary) sacrifice and am willing to put my name on it.

    I like that too. And I also use checks to pay bills. There’s something about a faceless entity having access to my accounts that I refuse to submit to. All the same, if there are several people in line behind me and I’m busy trying to figure out what the date is, I can’t help but think of those blasted credit card commercials where everything is flowing in some beautiful capitalistic mating dance and the one schmuck with a checkbook fucks everything up. But, like Julia said, writing checks is a sort of “slow down” measure for spending, opposed to the unthinking swipe of a debit or credit card.

  6. speedbird Says:
    January 29th, 2008 at 7:57 am

    High-street shops made it very difficult to pay by check about ten-fifteen years ago, as if they disapproved in some way.

    I find myself using them to pay tradesmen and owners of holiday cottages and B&Bs. Bite-sized businesses: they certainly don’t want the hassle of cards and I don’t want to carry flippin’ great wodges of cash around.

    I’m more worried about the number of places now that advertise that they don’t accept cash. Is that even legal?

  7. Cfraser Says:
    January 29th, 2008 at 9:00 am

    I haven’t seen any ‘no cash’ places yet. What kind of businesses have you seen that don’t take cash?

  8. Tim Boucher Says:
    January 29th, 2008 at 11:39 am

    What’s a high-street shop?

  9. Julia Says:
    January 29th, 2008 at 2:35 pm

    What’s a high-street shop?

    Wiki says it means Main St. but my understanding is that it’s Fifth Avenue level shopping. (And it means that speedbird is doing pretty well for himself, go speedbird.) So, you wouldn’t carry around enough to buy an Armani suit or a Tiffany bracelet. I’ve heard of places that don’t take cash but I haven’t encountered any here, I’ve just read about them in articles about the mark of the beast etc.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_Street

    http://www.high.st/

  10. speedbird Says:
    January 30th, 2008 at 4:23 am

    Man, talk about two nations divided by a common language! :-D

    Yeah, I guess Main Street is the same thing. Sorry, I don’t shop at Tiffany or Armani. Though one of the cool things about Tiffany, in London at least, is that anyone is still welcome to come in and /look/ at the merchandise. It’s well sparkly, and definitely one step up on your common bling. I mean, they have these big guys with earpieces lurking in the corners and you can’t see the price tags, but they still let scruffy oiks in to see what all the fuss is about. I guess a scruffy oik might be a pop star in this day and age, who knows [and no, I’m not translating ‘oik’ for those west of the Atlantic ;-D ]

  11. speedbird Says:
    January 30th, 2008 at 4:37 am

    (Bling is a chav word for a conspicuous, sparkly display of wealth
    Chav is (originally) a pikey word for trailer trash
    Pikey is what the chavs call the Romany and other travellers…

    ok, having offended everyone equally I’ll quit now :-D )



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