Question about lost checks.

[jadinolf]

Originally posted by: D1gger
You have to remember that banks make their money for charging money for everything that they do. If they could charge you for breathing air standing in line for a teller or an ATM, they would.

For sure.

 

[Zenmervolt]

Originally posted by: jdobratz
Nope, most of those little tricks people do with checks are not legally defined and do not need to be followed. Such as, writing VOID on a check does not really make it void, IIRC. Look up federal regulation C relating to financial laws, I believe that reg C is the one that deals mostly with checks. Furthremore, it is your resposibilty to ensure that items you are depositing are valid and endorsed properly, not that banks in 99% of the cases you will encounter. The laws are very much written to favor the banks.

Actually, they are. But only kinda.

For example, if you write "accepted as payment in full" on the back of a cheque, and it is endorsed and deposited then it is legally binding. But only if it can be reasonably assumed that the cheque would be read before being deposited. For example, cheques made out to a CC company are processed by an automated system which cannot ever read the additional instructions, so in that case it's not payment in full. However, if you write that on a cheque to Jon Doe down the street and he personally deposits the cheque, then it is legally "payment in full".

Essentially, if the cheque is processed by an automated system then you're screwed.

As for the OP; it does cost the bank money to stop the cheque. There are some pretty hefty administrative costs involved in "one-off" transactions like that. Even if the cheque has been stopped, there's no guarantee that it will not be cashed. If someone takes it to one of those cheque cashing places or to a bank other than yours and cashes it, then the money's gone and your bank gets the added hassle of having to wrangle with the other bank over that money.

Besides, the lost cheque is not the bank's fault. Why should they have to cover the cost?

ZV