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I don't think it's rude at all. In this day and age of electronic transfers, some businesses don't get a lot of checks and I don't bame them for not making daily trips to the bank. Of course if the business does a lot of cash business they increase their exposure to loss from theft or disaster, but that's their problem rather than mine.
Once you write the check the money should be considered gone and deducted from the available amount you have to spend. A week or even a month is not unreasonable.
I will say, my sister-in-law kept a check of ours for over six months and when she finally cashed it I was surprised to be $750 short on the balance of my checking account that I had looked at the day before. I had long forgot about the check at that point and luckily we keep enough in our checking that $750 didn't affect us but I felt that wasn't cool of her at the time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by LBTRS
Deducted from what? I certainly don't keep a register on my debit card and very rarely write a paper check anymore, heck I don't even carry a checkbook anymore. I keep track of the checking account balance online by looking at the banks running total of my balance. The bank doesn't reduce my available balance when I write a paper check, they reduce it when the check is cleared. I certainly had "deducted" it in my mind six months earlier but did forget about it over those six months. As I said, a week or even a month is reasonable but holding a check for six months isn't reasonable in my book.
We keep a cushion in our checking account for events just like this so if there is a screw-up somewhere it won't bite us. The screw-up was me forgetting about this outstanding paper check over those six months.
Do most people keep check registers these days with debit cards???
Um, Pitt Chick was was pointing out that the 2 paragraphs in your first post basically contradicted each other. First you say "Once you write the check the money should be considered gone and deducted from the available amount you have to spend" ... then you say you DID NOT do that with the $750 check you gave your sister-in-law. You really don't see how you contradicted yourself?
I agree that your SIL should have deposited the check earlier (I would have been bugging her about it after a week or two as I HATE having outstanding items), but you should have subtracted the $750 when you wrote the check (and you actually told the other poster to DO that ) so it should not have mattered whether it cleared a day later or six months later.
And I don't keep a check register, but I DO keep all my account info on my computer. Takes me about 2 minutes a day (literally) to go online, check my balance, see what's cleared, and then reconcile my computer record. And OF COURSE I record (and account for) every check that I write (and all other transactions for that matter).
As a landlord, we hold checks often. We deposit all checks for January that were received early on January 1st, the day the rent is due. Some people mail the check up to 2 weeks early. But in my opinion, the rent isn't due until the 1st, so it should come out of their account on the 1st, even if they were kind enough to send the check early. I don't think it is rude. I look at it that I am doing them the courtesy of not taking their money before rent is due.
Also, our grace period is through the 5th, so we get most of the rents between the 1st and the 5th, and we do deposits for rent on the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, then usually on about the 10th and 20th for late rents and odds and ends. So if you pay rent late on the 11th, it will likely sit for a few days before we deposit it.
I don't receive many personal checks, but do receive quite a few checks written on corporate accounts.
I throw them aside, and deposit them when the spirit moves me. It might be a few days, or it might be a few weeks.
I don't feel in the slightest any remorse for not rushing down to the bank to deposit the funds. I am sure that Merrill Lynch loves me and a few hundred thousand others who hold a few million dollars in their checks, while they use the funds. It is a very cheap source of funding when someone doesn't cash your check.
Many corporate checks have a little note 'not good after 90 days/six months or whatever, so I try not to breach that hurdle. Otherwise, I deposit them when I deposit them, and don't feel any hesitation about it being in any way impolite/rude/improper.
Once you write the check the money should be considered gone and deducted from the available amount you have to spend. A week or even a month is not unreasonable.
I will say, my sister-in-law kept a check of ours for over six months and when she finally cashed it I was surprised to be $750 short on the balance of my checking account that I had looked at the day before. I had long forgot about the check at that point and luckily we keep enough in our checking that $750 didn't affect us but I felt that wasn't cool of her at the time.
Seems if you kept a check book you would have known that check did not clear. Checking balance on line can be dangerous for this reason.
Um, Pitt Chick was was pointing out that the 2 paragraphs in your first post basically contradicted each other. First you say "Once you write the check the money should be considered gone and deducted from the available amount you have to spend" ... then you say you DID NOT do that with the $750 check you gave your sister-in-law. You really don't see how you contradicted yourself?
I agree that your SIL should have deposited the check earlier (I would have been bugging her about it after a week or two as I HATE having outstanding items), but you should have subtracted the $750 when you wrote the check (and you actually told the other poster to DO that ) so it should not have mattered whether it cleared a day later or six months later.
And I don't keep a check register, but I DO keep all my account info on my computer. Takes me about 2 minutes a day (literally) to go online, check my balance, see what's cleared, and then reconcile my computer record. And OF COURSE I record (and account for) every check that I write (and all other transactions for that matter).
I certainly did do that, I deducted the amount of the check from my balance and considered the money was gone. As I said, somewhere during that six months I forgot about the check and it surprised me when she finally got around to cashing it. The money was still in my checking account, I had not spent it "again". There is no contradiction in what I was saying as I was addressing the fact that the OP seemed to think it was still his/her money to spend as long as it was still in his account. I was addressing the "If you don't need the money I could use it." part of his/her post.
As I said, I don't keep a register or spreadsheet as that seems a lot of work for something I can look at in real time every day on my banks website. My post was not advocating to the OP that they should keep a register as I don't even do that myself. If finances were tighter and I had to know exactly when money was coming and going then I would have to go back to tracking it that closely myself.
I'm not sure if this belongs on this forum or not, but I'm just curious what you all think. I wrote a check a week ago for cleaning services and it still has not been deposited. Does anyone else think it is rude to not deposit a check right away? I've always thought if you are providing a service and the person is paying you the least you could do is deposit the check right away. If you don't need the money I could use it.
This isn't asking for advice, just curious what the rest of you think about this.
I don't think this is rude or anything else....my cleaning lady makes deposits maybe twice a month..am sure for her that is when her bills come due..my masseuse and hairdresser sometimes don't cash checks for weeks..
I also consider the money gone once the check is written..and keep a healthy balance..
Yes it is their choice.
But not cashing or depositing their money **is** irresponsible and and it **is** foolish.
hth
I believe this is a fairly relative issue.
My bank's nearest branch is 50 miles from where I live. It seems to me that it would be more irresponsible and foolish to make a special trip in order to deposit a check.
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) so it should not have mattered whether it cleared a day later or six months later.
