"Double-checking the Checks" by Troy H. Cheek on Jan 26, 2005

I was paying off some bills the other day, which wasn't as easy as it sounds. With six stitches in the palm of my writing hand, signing a check was pretty much out of the question. Luckily, I remembered that as a special service to me, my local bank apparently doesn't bother actually checking anything like that before paying out the check. They just pay out whatever the cashing bank tells them to.

I say that again. It doesn't matter how I write the check. My bank doesn't look at it. They just pay out whatever the cashing bank tells them to.

Truth.

Some years back, I noticed that my checking account balance was quite a few hundred dollars lower than it should have been. A quick glance at my returned checks showed that a payment to a credit card issued by another bank had been paid for several times the specified amount. I naturally took this up with my bank.

"Thank you for choosing County Bank. How can we serve you today?"

"Yeah, who do I talk to about y'all paying out checks for the wrong amounts?"

"Oh, sure, that could never happen. Our computer cross-checks every transaction."

"Well, it happened here." I gave her the check and the statement. I pointed out the discrepancies, just in case she didn't notice the underlining in red ink and the purple day-glo highlighter.

"Let's see what the computer has to say." Click click clickety click. "No, sir. No mistake. National Bank cashed the check as $510 and that's exactly what we deducted from your account."

I pointed to the check again. "That's the problem. I wrote the check for $150."

"Well, that's not what National Bank cashed it for."

"My penmanship isn't the greatest in the world, and I admit the numbers are a bit smudged, but it's easy enough to read the $150."

"National Bank cashed it as $510."

"And the printed out part clearly says 'one hundred fifty and 00/100 dollars' in my best cursive script."

"But their bank reported it as $510."

I sighed. "You keep saying that like it's important. What does it matter what they report it as? Don't you pay what's actually on the check?"

"Of course not, sir. Payment is handled automatically by the computer. Whatever the bank cashing the check reports is what we pay out."

"Even when the check is clearly made out for another amount?"

"Well, how would we know that, sir?"

"By looking at the check and checking the transaction?"

"How could we do that, sir?"

I made a big production of picking up the check in front of her, mimed looking up the transaction on an imaginary computer, and finally dialed an invisible phone. "Hello, National Bank? This is County Bank. One of our customers wrote a check for $150 and you cashed it for $510. What's up with that?"

"Sir, we couldn't do that unless we had the check here."

"Well, don't you?" I waved the check at her.

"Of course not. First of all, we don't even handle physical checks anymore. That's an electronically-reproduced copy you're holding there. Secondly, we process the transactions days or even weeks before that copy gets back to us."

"Well, don't you double-check the transactions when the information does come to you?"

"Why would we do that?"

I took several calming breaths. "To keep from paying out the wrong amount on a check like you did here."

"But we didn't. National Bank cashed it as $510 and that's exactly what we paid out. Everything comes out even. It was paid correctly, just for a different amount than what you wrote it for."

(I had a flashback to a bad horror movie. "Doctor, we must stop this mad experiment. You're killing him!" - "Nonsense, the equations are balancing perfectly!" - Patient drops dead.)

Another deep breath. "What do I have to do to make sure that a check is not paid 'correctly' for what just happens to be a different amount than what I wrote it for?"

"Just check your monthly statement and bring any discrepancies to our attention."

"That's exactly what I did. I notice that we're still arguing about it."

Her eyes lit up. "Oh, you want to change the payment amount? Why didn't you say so." Within seconds, she had corrected the problem. Apparently, it's now possible to change the amount that a check is written for after it has been cashed.

"How do we make sure this never happens again?"

"Just check your monthly statement and bring any discrepancies to our attention."

"You said that before. How do we make sure that such discrepancies don't happen to begin with?"

"Well, there's no way to that we can know in advance that you want to pay a check for a different amount than it was cashed for."

"Never mind."

And just to prove that I'm not the only one who has problems with his bank tellers, here's a story told as true by a friend of mine.

Steve: Hi, I want to cash this check.

Teller: I need your ID.

Steve: OK, here's my driver's license.

Teller: Sir, this is expired.

Steve: No it isn't, turn it over: there's a renewal sticker on the back.

Teller: ahhh.....OK.

Steve: I did it over the Internet, like they told me to.

Teller: I see now.

Steve: But, I have a question....

Teller: What?

Steve: Even if the license was expired, so what? It still identifies me as Steve Blank, right?

Teller: Yes, but it's expired.

Steve: That just means my right to drive expired. It doesn't mean I stopped being Steve Blank, right?

Teller: It's expired.

Steve: I'm still Steve Blank, regardless of the expiration date, right?

Teller: An expired license is invalid, sir.

Steve: Yes, it's invalid as far as being able to drive, but I don't stop being Steve Blank when it expires, do I?

Teller: I can call my manager if you want.

Steve: No, forget it, I'm sorry, I was just curious.

Teller: Here's your money, sir.

Steve: Thank you.

Teller: Have a good day, sir.

Steve: Bye.

Copyright 2005 by Troy H. Cheek. Reprint with prior written permission only. Comments and questions to