Don't be a jerk; Write checks for an extra $5.

[The Big Ben]

sigh...

Since you're continuing to try to change the subject, why not start another thread?

Minus credit card discussion, my original post stands.

[Tundratubast]

but as a libertarian and advocate of personal freedom who strives to follow my conscience , I believe I have the absolute right to set my rates at whatever I choose whenever I choose for whatever reason I choose.

So based on this perspective, and the basis of our capitalistic market place and society. The banks, and other financial types of intsitutions whom choose to establish fees for services, also have the "absolute right to set [their] rates at whatever [they] choose, whenever [they] choose [and]for whatever reason [they] choose", without regard to Blokes' Policy or Rant of the Day.

When I make payment to a person for an item, I expect that payment is accepted as "Payment in Full" at point of sale, and am not responsible for the other persons' cost of doing their personal business to convert one form of currency to another. So, a bank has everyright to charge for this same conversion service.

Back in 1974, while in the Navy, I was 18 years old and station in Norfolk. I could not cash a $75.00 Dept. of Treasury Navy payroll check in Washington D.C., two blocks from the Treasury Dept., Why? Because I didn't have an account at the bank. Do you really think this process or service should have gotten easier in 25 years.

[Tubaryan12]

If I go to pay my bill with someone and I hand them a wad of folded bills and say the money's all there, then that person unfolds the bills and it's $1 short.......who is at fault?

I believe bloke's complaint is not with the bank per se, It's with the person offering up a payment in a way that they know will not be honored for it's full face value, and not telling you that before hand.

With that being said, If you are going to accept payment in checks, then you must have a checking account....be it business, or personal. Like it or not, it's just the way the world works today.

[Mark]

sigh...

Since you're continuing to try to change the subject, why not start another thread?

Minus credit card discussion, my original post stands.

I like cheese.

Merry Christmas!

[Rick Denney]

I believe bloke's complaint is not with the bank per se, It's with the person offering up a payment in a way that they know will not be honored for it's full face value, and not telling you that before hand.

On the other hand, Bank of America hasn't exactly notified me that the people to whom I write checks and who are not customers of Bank of America might be charged a fee for turning those checks into cash. And nobody has complained before now to bring it to my attention. The only reason I know this at all is because Joe is saying so (I don't doubt him, but I also don't know the full scope of the rules governing the situation). I do know that I have never been charged a fee by Bank of America to deposit checks written to me, no matter what bank they were drawn against.

If I didn't have a bank account for depositing such checks, I think I would refuse to accept checks, and that's a decision that isn't related to whether it is personal or business. Normally, the only private transactions of that type in which I engage are either handled with cash (for amounts small enough to make $5 significant) or large enough so that I don't care about the five bucks. But, again, I have never been charged for depositing such checks.

In general, I think banks would prefer not to have to service checks. I suspect they see them as an anachronism. I never even carry my checkbook around unless I know I'm going to need it for a major purchase that does not accept a charge card. Instead, I use a check card or a charge card. But wait--businesses must pay to accept those forms of payment as well. Most do it and build the cost into their price. In private sales, it is completely normal to ask a person to pay for the cost of getting cash up front. I have seen many, many private-sale ads that require the buyer to pay, say, Paypal fees in addition to shipping. I have also offered to drive people I don't know to their bank so that they could write them the check and hand me the cash--but that's a response to risk rather than cost.

The one difference I have with Joe is that a check is not cash and never has been. It is not a promissory note. It is a draft on a bank account. Accepting a check is a favor granted to the payor by the payee. It has never been free if the time required to take it to the bank is worth anything, not to mention the risk (which is, of course, a real cost). And it apparently now has a bit more cost associated with it than it used to for some folks. I would prefer not to receive checks for the simple reason that the time required to take it to the bank is an inconvenience, especially for small amounts. If I owned a business, of course, I would need enough of a bank account to prevent having to pay these fees so that I could be nice to my customers.

In a free-enterprise world, it is completely acceptable from a moral perspective for any service provider to require a payment for that service. If the market is unwilling to pay it, then those providers will lose business from those people. The alternative is to refuse checks written on their bank, and take business elsewhere. Calling it a scam and declaring it immoral, however, is a little surprising coming from one who is normally so committed to plain free enterprise.

Rick "who hates poor bank service but doesn't blame his friends and customers for it" Denney

[Rick Denney]

He who hands another individual a representation of worth not knowing that part of it will be confiscated by his bank is not being wise. If he does know (and does not disclose this to the recipient) he is not being honorable.

On the other hand, if you are the recipient, and knowing that the person writing the check will never be likely to know, you have no right to declare those writing those checks as jerks in response to their ignorance. And since nearly everyone has a bank account into which they can deposit such checks without cost, assuming that the person they are providing with that check doesn't is not going with the percentages. Do you really expect people to ask, "By the way, do you have a bank account? If not, BofA might charge you a fee to cash this check"? We write checks on BofA to our friends for all sorts of thing, like pet-sitting, tree-cutting, and so on, and sometimes even for small amounts (my wife doesn't carry cash around like I do). Nobody has ever complained yet. I write checks to give to my college-student nieces, and they also have not complained, though I have zero doubt that their mother (my sister) would hear about it and pass it along to me. But, like nearly everyone we know, they have bank accounts into which they can deposit checks. The worst issue they face is that the bank may put a hold on the check if they don't have enough on deposit to cover it.

As the person who is outside the norm, maybe it's up to you to work with the situation, instead of requiring everyone else to.

Rick "who has never been charged such a fee yet" Denney

[rocksanddirt]

Interesting discussion.

BofA has really lost whatever customer focus they had when the were bought out by MBNA and moved to somewhere in the south.

[Tundratubast]

HOLY COW BLOKE: You're such a gloom an doomer, you'd better run and hide farther in them thar hills than you already have, or simple leave the country and find the one that will provide you with all your needs for free, or what ever you're willing to produce and provide for yourself. Isolationism, has been proven countless times to be counter productive, but bitch'n with out solutions isn't an answer either. I've noticed you always seem to speak intelligently about whats wrong, never what's right. Have you ever given anything to the country, or is it simply one caustic remark after another. Bitch, bitch, bitch and bury your head in the sand. At a boy.

[TubaRay]

I believe in most of his semi-political comments, Joe is probably right on top of the situation. I believe he has, at best, over-stated this case. Millions and millions of folks without a bank account. I doubt this. If it is true, the people without the bank account are not being "wise." They may, however, be "honorable."

[bisontuba]

Hi-
Solution: If not PayPal, use Postal Money Orders--you can go to any Post office and cash them. BTW, I did learn something interesting this year--EVEN with a certified bank check and/or draft, many businesses are now holding them JUST LIKE a personnel check for 7-10 days to see if they clear--the reason being is that there are some amazing copies made by scam artists these days of certified checks--once again, the ONLY thing that doesn't need to clear-besides cash--is a postal money order. Granted, the cap is $700 per M.O., but you can get them in multiples.
mark

[Rick Denney]

Rick,

Surely your world is larger than you represent it to be.

No. The world at large may be, but my world isn't. Nor do I think it is for most people. I don't pay illegal immigrants for anything, and if they happen to work from someone I do pay, that is their problem. None of the people to whom I write checks don't have bank accounts in which they can deposit them. If they asked for cash, I would provide it. I have, on occasions, even bought USPS postal money orders, which can be cashed at a post office (but which are limited in size). Most banks charge to cash money orders and have always done so, in addition to the charges required of those buying them. Again, that's a fee for the service of conversion. Personal checks are becoming less useful and I no longer even write checks for monthly bills--I do that using an online bill-payer service and have done with perfect reliability for at least half a dozen years now.

My wife writes a lot more checks than I do--for stuff in the hundred-dollar range and less I nearly always pay cash, and I no longer carry a checkbook with me routinely.

This has nothing to do with points you would like to sneak in about the future of the dollar, by the way.

Rick "thinking Joe's imagination about the world at large can also be pretty narrow at times" Denney

[MartyNeilan]

bloke "OK...If you want to change the subject, I'll discuss your topic."

Should I buy a piston BBb or a rotary CC in lacquer or silver?

[Tundratubast]

Who changes the subject? You did in the this post.

bloke "who predicts (as USD are transfigured into mini-pesos) that wooded land (for logging/game), cultivatable land, and livestock will be some of the primary representations of wealth in a future USA (prior to the nation's final absolute demise/collapse)"

Every sound bite is a pseudo-political statement, Every sentence is laden with over written text to impress yourself and who ever cares about the Blah blah, blah. Rick D. responses are simply stated and understood by all. Your blowhard approach is humorous at best. Self appointing Bloke Policy, such as Posting a Sales Price, and other yak yak. Do something positive, run for city council, rural township board, school board. Report to the board about something positive. Let's hear about the glass being FULL, not empty.

By the way don't make assumption about others income, you can't verify. That's a pretty nice piece of property you have out there in country. My two bedroom apartment here in the snow bank isn't that nice. I, who pays more in child support than take home pay. Gotta Love Minnesota welfare structure. And yep, where the same age, no golden parachute here either, but I'm not crying in my "homemade soup".

So smile a little, no one knows what tomorrow will bring. Negativism is a poison. Please stop poisoning this great well of information

[iiipopes]

Okay, the question's just begging to be asked...

If B of A is such a piece of s**t, why is it the #2 bank in the U.S. (judged by total deposits)???

Something must be motivating people to put their money there...

Todd, wondering

I'll tell you exactly why, because many years ago I worked for a bank for a year that was a take-over target. The reason they are so large is as follows:

1) With the sky's-the-limit business philosophy of the '80's and '90's, when they were still called NationsBank, they started buying up all the little to midsized local and regional banks they could convince to sell, buying them on leverage and convincing the Controller of the Currency that they still had adequate margin capital ratios as they did so.

2) At the same time, the other big west coast player, BankAmerica (you know -- the folks who invented the BankAmericard, now known as VISA), was doing the same thing, but with larger banks and larger leveraging.

3) But when BankAmerica's deals didn't go well, that made them a target, so NationsBank bought them, and these two banks merged in a huge fanfare to become Bank of America.

4) The tactics were as follows: A) They would basically make offers the shareholders of the targets couldn't refuse, because even if leveraged, the economy was growing at such a rate it would cover the margin within two years. B) Once taken over, there would be a big media blitz of "everything as usual" or "caring about the community," etc. (cough). They'd even "honor your old checks...you don't have to get new ones..." Then over time, they'd analyze where the segment of business for that area was with the highest profit margin, focus on that, and start sloughing off the rest (that's how I lost my job -- I was in a department that although it made money, had a loyal customer base, and continuity of buisness, it didn't have the desired profit margin post takeover), and over time start imposing all these fees and practices that are the subject of this thread. Add to that a huge marketing budget, and that got them where they are now.

A friend of mine tells a story right after B of A had taken over and started these garbage fees and practices. He had always cashed his paycheck at the drive through, as his employer banked at B of A, but he didn't. One day, he drove through as usual and the teller said since he wasn't a bank customer, she could no longer cash his check, citing new policy he would have to come into the bank during lobby hours. He grinned, and asked her if she knew why the new policy was in place. Of course she answered no. He reminded her that if they declined to cash checks drive through, then they would need less tellers and her job could be eliminated. She cashed his check.

[MartyNeilan]

bloke "OK...If you want to change the subject, I'll discuss your topic."

When my divorce is finalized, should I date blonds, brunettes, or redheads?
(Or, all of the above, just not at the same time?)