• Welcome to the FREE TUGBBS forums! The absolute best place for owners to get help and advice about their timeshares for more than 32 years!

    Join Tens of Thousands of other owners just like you here to get any and all Timeshare questions answered 24 hours a day!
  • TUG started 32 years ago in October 1993 as a group of regular Timeshare owners just like you!

    Read about our 32nd anniversary: Happy 32nd Birthday TUG!
  • TUG has a YouTube Channel to produce weekly short informative videos on popular Timeshare topics!

    All subscribers auto-entered to win all free TUG membership giveaways!

    Visit TUG on Youtube!
  • TUG has now saved timeshare owners more than $24,000,000 dollars just by finding us in time to rescind a new Timeshare purchase! A truly incredible milestone!

    Read more here: TUG saves owners more than $24 Million dollars
  • Sign up to get the TUG Newsletter for free!

    Tens of thousands of subscribing owners! A weekly recap of the best Timeshare resort reviews and the most popular topics discussed by owners!
  • Our official "end my sales presentation early" T-shirts are available again! Also come with the option for a free membership extension with purchase to offset the cost!

    All T-shirt options here!
  • A few of the most common links here on the forums for newbies and guests!

First the penny, now the paper check?

That would be bad. As more businesses charge a credit card fee, some people resort to checks. Some small businesses don’t accept cc payments. Some customers don’t use Zelle or PayPal, etc. Cash over a certain amount wouldn’t be safe to carry.
 
Paying your timeshare maintenance fees with a credit card oftentimes gets you slapped with a $25 "convenience fee". Sending out a paper check avoids such fees.
 
It seems the fed just wants to get out of the check processing business, but it may not eliminate paper checks. It would just put the burden on banks to rely more on interbank check processing via a private clearing house. Which many do already. Or rely on merchants to convert checks to electronic payments before they are presented to a bank. Many checks are already processed without ever going through the fed.
 
dioxide45 said:
It seems the fed just wants to get out of the check processing business, but it may not eliminate paper checks. It would just put the burden on banks to rely more on interbank check processing via a private clearing house. Which many do already. Or rely on merchants to convert checks to electronic payments before they are presented to a bank. Many checks are already processed without ever going through the fed.
Click to expand...


Absolutely. That was the situation (checks processed w/o going thru the Fed) many many years ago when I was in banking
 
Brett said:
Yes, the banks want their 5% "convenience" CC fee
Click to expand...

Having been on an HOA board, I can tell you that convenience fee is paid to the HOA, and reimburses the HOA for the fees charged to them by the credit card processor. Credit card acceptance agreements in the US (but not in Europe) used to prohibit that, but now they allow it. Back when it was prohibited, we did a work around by charging an m/f at a higher rate, then offered a "discount for cash" at our real m/f level.
 
The last check I used, the Walmart just ran the check through their machine and it came out of my account as a debit, and they handed me back my check.
 
Patri said:
That would be bad. As more businesses charge a credit card fee, some people resort to checks. Some small businesses don’t accept cc payments. Some customers don’t use Zelle or PayPal, etc. Cash over a certain amount wouldn’t be safe to carry.
Click to expand...

I used Paypal years ago, then had an incident where i cancelled the account and have not used them since. Just before I left to go work in Europe, I bought a tankless water heater online, and the documents clearly showed it was to be delivered to my street address in North Carolina. My wife went with me for a few weeks and then had some things to take care of for several months at home, so I set it up with the post office to forward any mail addressed to my PO Box to me in Europe but to deliver anything addressed to my street address to that NC address. Instead, the seller sent it to my credit card address, which was the PO Box address and it was forwarded to Europe. When I called and complained about that, the seller said the reason they did it was a Paypal rule that to have a certain Paypal status they had to send all items ordered to the mailing address on the credit card. That made no sense at all to me, but when I contacted Paypal, the seller apparently had that right. It was a very stupid rule, and resulted in me having to bring the tankless water heater home at Christmas with my luggage and my wife had to wait to get it installed. Fortunately, it was for our second floor bathroom and we were not really using the second floor at the time.

I cancelled my Paypal account immediately and have no use for them since.

Paper checks are useful for me in buying precious metals. I can use wire transfers, but only get one free one a month, or credit cards which get an extra fee. Checks are the best way to avoid fees.
 
Brett said:
Like the penny, checks won't disappear anytime soon.
But I (almost) never use checks so it wouldn't bother me if checks "faced the axe"
Click to expand...

That sounds right. We pay all of our monthly and quarterly taxes with physical checks. They probably accept an electronic check. I should look into that.

Bill
 
youppi said:
In USA, you can't pay bills by Interac e-Transfer ?
Click to expand...
No such thing. Something comparable here might be Zelle, but that is more for interbank transfers not bill pay. The closest thing would be where banks have setup their own online bill pay. Which in many cases result in ACH transactions (that may also go through the Fed). Though in some cases, the bank might actually cut a check and send it to the company whose bill you are paying. That happens when the payee isn't setup to receive electronic payments.
 
Last edited:
We write very few checks. House payments, utilities, etc. are all paid online or through a direct withdrawal from our bank. We've even gone to paying maintenance fees and property taxes, for both our timeshares and our home (prop tax). We do write checks for our income tax returns to the Fed and State. If they don't want checks any more does that mean we don't have to pay? :D
 
jeffox said:
The last check I used, the Walmart just ran the check through their machine and it came out of my account as a debit, and they handed me back my check.
Click to expand...
How can you safely write a check in Walmart? Can't someone behind you in line just snap a picture of your check and have all of the information they need to drain your bank account?
 
My DW has a private caretaker who only accepts cash or checks.
I visit an ATM once a week and pay in cash. Others pay her by check.

While an agency would do CC's, she costs less and does more.
So it goes with many personal services without business infrastructure.
.
 
Last edited:
I just wrote a check for a deposit for some work we are having done at our house because they were going to charge 3.5% if we used a credit card.

But I rarely use checks. It’s ACH or credit cards, usually through Apple Pay or on auto pay for recurring bills.
 
TolmiePeak said:
How can you safely write a check in Walmart? Can't someone behind you in line just snap a picture of your check and have all of the information they need to drain your bank account?
Click to expand...
No, the machine reads magnetic ink on the checks, a picture wont have that ink. It's been more than a decade since I've had my checkbook outside the house, so I don't know if they still do that.
 
jeffox said:
No, the machine reads magnetic ink on the checks, a picture wont have that ink. It's been more than a decade since I've had my checkbook outside the house, so I don't know if they still do that.
Click to expand...
Wouldn't you just print new checks and then cash them? A picture has all of the information you would need to print another check.
 
TolmiePeak said:
How can you safely write a check in Walmart? Can't someone behind you in line just snap a picture of your check and have all of the information they need to drain your bank account?
Click to expand...
Check washing is still a problem. Apparently your physical check which you mailed is removed from the USPS and the payee and amounts are written and cashed for more. These thieves convince USPS employees to assist them and pull obvious bill envelopes from the mail. It happens more to small businesses but I read recently where it happened to an individual. The check was rewritten for $7,000. I believe his bank reimbursed him. He was upset because he made a point of taking the envelope inside the Post Office to send it.

I haven't used my mailbox for outgoing mail for probably close to 40 years. It shows it's safer to use other methods of payment when possible, and keep a small balance in your account.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top