to think you can't JUST take cheques?!

[hairtoday1]

I'm viewing a to buy a property tomorrow. If I like it I need to move fast. I've just been informed that 'To reserve a property you will need to provide a cheque for £100.00 payable to Metropolitan. We do not take any other payment methods on the day so without this you cannot reserve.'

Erm, really? I haven't had a cheque book in YEARS!

Is it me or is this bonkers? I could miss out on a home because of this

Melonfool

Thanks, I had a feeling that was the case.

So unless we can develop a technically equivalent system, where the sender doesn't need and can't discover the payees baking details, we're stuck with cheques. As I say, virtual currencies can address this, but they're not very popular.

I have a cheque book issued automatically for my business account (that I rarely use) but have to request one for my personal bank account. I only use cheques for school payments as the other alternative is cash which I don't tend to carry much of. I occasionally get a cheque from a customer as payment but most use card payments.

lurking and melon you could just use PayPal. All you need is an email address.

Cheques will be largely defunct soon. Except in America - they have a bizarre reliance on them.

LittleBearPad what do you propose that charities that require 2 signatories do for payments without cheques?

LittleBearPad

you could just use PayPal. All you need is an email address.

nice try, but the problem is, that assumes the payee has PayPal, which is a specific (very specific) proprietary service. Unlike a generic "bank account".

There were some NFC initiatives a while back, to have a system whereby "bonked" phones could swap a payment, originally an Apple development. Unfortunately it fell flat on it's face when the banks realised it cut them out of the equation (which incidentally has been the stumbling block since day one with regards to 21st century money transfers). Also any ideas about using [smart]phones as payment vectors has run smack in to the greed of the network operations (EE, O2 etc) who keep strangling ideas by wanting their slice of the pie.

No one loathes cheques more than me. But even I have to admit, they're not easily replaced. In fact the less used they become, the incentive to "replace" them becomes less too. I can quite easily see a future 50 years hence, where cheques still exist for oddball (probably legal) applications.

Actually, at least here in NI, they said they were going to get rid of all cheques a few years ago.

Before it was instituted, they (who are they?) changed their minds. Cheques are still used a lot in business. In my previous life, before I became SE, I wrote hundreds of cheques for the company I worked for. It was our preferred method of payment.

Cheques are here to stay.

Lurking, ApplePay is a real thing, at least in the US. It's rolling out in the UK sometime soon.

I wasn't talking about ApplePay. I was talking about a system whereby you loaded an app on your phone, touched it against someone elses phone, and transferred money that way. No need to know anything about the other person.

A closer situation would be if you could pay one person by tapping your debit card against theirs.

"They' are a combination of the Treasury and the Payments Council (now Payments UK), the latter of which is owned by the major banks.

Then there is the Cheque and Credit Clearing Company who oversee cheques in the UK and are also owned by the major banks.
These are regulated by the Payment Systems Regulator.

There are no plans to get rid of cheques, not even in ten years time.
But there is a programme to digitalise them, whereby you will scan cheques yourself on your phone and send it directly to the bank, being able to access cleared funds the next day.

Oh and Apply pay rolled put here a couple of weeks ago, I have a few colleagues who use it, and Pret take it already.

You don't need the other persons bank details for PayM, they need to be set up and you must need their mobile number.

The govt is the biggest issuer of cheques, followed by the Pools. And there are still nearly three million written permission day.

Its the "on the day" bit that is making this be cheque only. They have not got the facility to accept cards on the day or check that direct transfers via mobile banking have been received.....

of course yoru cheque could be rubber.....

Charities requiring two signatories is only a control on payments. Similar controls can be done electronically with a two step authorisation process.

Cheques may linger in certain circumstances but they aren't critical to many people.

Once again

ApplePay is nothing like a cheque.

I don't think people are directly comparing them although it is a method of payment so not wholly different.

No-one has suggested Apple pay is remotely like a cheque. But don't let that stop you talking down to people.

No-one has suggested Apple pay is remotely like a cheque

then why mention it more than once it in a thread about cheques ?

But don't let that stop you talking down to people.

Because we are all individuals, I don't think any one person had mentioned it more than once. And the conversation had moved on to various types of payment method.

Cheques will have to be here to stay-the only way for some people.