She cashed both fucking cheques!!

[VeryFuckingPissedOff]

Sent somebody a cheque for their birthday. They 'lost it' and asked me to send another. Prehaps I was foolish to do so, but I did. Now, both cheques have come out of my fucking bank account!!!!

My husband, son and two grandsons have the same first initial and surname. I can understand people making a mistake when paying cheques in.

Glad you got it sorted OP.

I would be cautos about blame until you speak to her. Banks aren't as stringent as so may think. My mum and I both bank at the same bank an I left my cheque book lying around and she wrote a cheque for the insurance man with by accident signing her own name and it still got cashed.

"I'd give her the benefit of the doubt. Say nothing. No gift next year. Less embarrassing for all."

Blimey! Some new definition of "benefit of the doubt"
I haven't previously come across!

Just out of curiosity, did your relative request a cheque in the first instance?

Maybe next year, if you are still speaking? Send a giftcard!

Also why would you pay a personal check into a business account? Surely you'd pay it into a personal account?

I wonder if any other cheques were lost? Maybe from other relatives?

If you are chaotic enough to have piles of cheques lying around your house and to keep losing some of them, you are chaotic enough to cash relatives' and customers' cheques into the same account until you get round to catching up on the bookkeeping and bank reconciliations and realise you have cocked up and paid money into the wrong account (or, in this case, your dh has done it for you...).

I still don't understand why anyone would automatically assume that a family member would be trying to defraud them. And in such a ridiculous way which would be found out almost immediately.

Think some people are getting carried away with the knowing cynicism bit. This would be a stupid way to try and steal money, and knowing quite a lot of freelancers I can entirely believe the stack of cheques story. It's explained. Relative cocked up, was embarrassed and apologetic, accepted OP's offer to keep the second cheque as a Xmas present. There is nothing suspicious there, nothing at all. Not even if some MNers would have reacted differently or returned the money despite OP's offer.

I may be being thick here but how do you know it wasn't cashed in by someone else - because it was lost and not cancelled so surely entirely likely?

OK, multitasking gone wrong. Forget I was ever here.

If the cheque was reportd as lost there wouldnt have been a charge to cancel it but its a relative who the OP trusted.
People saying its naive to think someone couldnt or wouldnt alter a cheque, thats fraud and quite rare for £25. I work in a bank and have had this exact same issue happen where the received paid a group of cheques in and mistakenly thought theyd lost one cheque. They made an instant payment to the issuer a week later.

Something a little like this happened to me last Christmas - 2 relatives gave me cheques, but I had some surgery last December and wasn't able to get around by myself. For One reason or another, I then forgot about the cheques folded up in a side compartment in my purse.

One relative texted in February to say they'd noticed it hadn't been cashed and should they send another? I apologised profusely and said no, I had it, but that because of all that had happened, getting to the bank was tough, and even when well, I can only make it once a week. They suggested that they just do a direct transfer in future and I jumped at the chance.

I then called the other relative and apologised, explaining all the same stuff, and asked if the cheques was still ok to cash, or else I was happy to leave it. They said to cash it and would I prefer the cash in future? Again I said yes please!

My birthday was great this year - one of them did a transfer, the other slipped me cash in a card when we met for lunch.

I can understand how your relative cocked up, but if she did realise she had 2 cheques from you then she should have been polite and checked with you whether you had cancelled the first. I think that would look more honest. As it is she either pays very little attention or was chancing her arm a bit.

I think some pp are being incredibly generous here. The relative did not sound surprised at the news that both cheques had been paid in. She had her story entirely clear about how it had happened but had made no attempt to put it right before the OP spoke to her.
If she was genuinely embarrassed and it was a genuine mistake, why didn't she ring the OP herself and put it right?

Flowersinyourhair - you have no idea how the conversation actually went, you are just making a negative assumption. It could just have easily been that the OP said she noticed both cheques were cashed on exactly the same date, said what the date was and the relative put two and two together. I don't think it helps anyone to view this in a negative light, unless they were already looking for an excuse to cut their relative out of their life. Sending birthday presents and Christmas presents sounds like a fairly close relationship, though, not one you would want to ruin on a potential misunderstanding. If cheques don't work, then give gifts in other ways in future. If anything similar ever happens again, be considerably more suspicious. If this has previously been a two-way relationship of trust and liking, it would be a shame if this ruined it.

Still sounds a bit dodgy to me. I'd be sending future monetary gifts by BACS if at all

Apart from if you run a small business, I'm amazed at the number of cheques people pay in! I had a tax rebate recently and that was a cheque and it was the first one I'd paid in for 18 months! I'd certainly be noticing that I'd paid in two identical cheques on the same day! As I say, unless you run a business, what on earth are all these cheques for?

Me and all my family use online banking as does everyone I know, do people really come into contact with so many cheques? I pay for odd jobs online, builders, plumbers, gardening work, I pay the window cleaner online, everyone. I'm intrigued by all these cheques floating around. To be honest, i I was giving a gift I wouldn't post a cheque, I would contact the recipient and ask for there bank details and send a card telling them to look out for a gift from me in their bank account on a certain date. My nearest branch to pay a cheque in is a 22mile round trip, I hate cheques.

Lots of people still use cheques - that's why the banks couldn't get rid of them as a form of payment when they wanted to.

I still use cheques-
School trips
Sports clubs
Cheques to friends/family

I get lots of cheques from customers. Dp's family always use them for money presents. I have 9 to pay in today as a matter of fact! I I use cheques for school things and for paying for extra curricular things. There are still plenty about

Must just be me then!

No- loads of people would say the same. But not all schools have Parent Pay , and I don'5 think most families are as cheque oriented as DPs. And I think a lot of micro small busnesses like me still get paid by cheque. I prefer it, actually- I find it much easier to keep track of.

That not true. She obviously deals with cheques all the time if she has a 'pile of them'. She must have a place where they all go at her house to keep them together. I think it's unlikely she lost it.
Also, she must be very cheeky to ring and ask you for another one first place! I'd say she thought you wouldn't notice. Or would be too polite to say anything if you did notice.
I would have cancelled both of them if possible and would probably investigated further. Too late now but I'd advise not to give her money again.

Pile of work cheques. Lost personal cheque. Dh sees cheque lying around and adds it to the work cheques pile. Lost in plain sight. But yes, asking for another rather than being too embarrassed to admit you've lost it is probably not what I would have done!

Well, if I lost a cheque I would certainly tell the person who sent it to me. I would be a bit pissed off if I sent one and though the recipient couldn't be bothered to pay it in or if they didn't pay it in quickly when I knew I had the money in he bank to cover it.

Sorry I just realised that she is putting work money in to the same account as birthday money. No wonder she is making mistakes.

I am glad you got it sorted anyway!

If you're a sole trader then you are indistinguishable from your business so you can use a personal account for your business. May not be a good idea - and the bank probably won't like it (as they'd prefer you to pay them for a business account) - but there's nothing wrong with it.
I find her explanation and the whole story perfectly plausible. The bit where the sender's name is on the cheque is in tiny print. If she has lots of business related cheques and her DH found a cheque made out to her it's completely believable that he put it in the pile without inspecting it closely. I agree that I would never ask for a replacement cheque though unless it was my mum or dad who'd given it to me! Far too embarrassing!