Rain is in our forecast and the incoming clouds created quite a dramatic sunset.
I don't like to brag or anything buy my credit union sent me a letter telling me that they will automatically cover any overdrafts in my checking account for a mere $28 a pop. Just because I am a valued customer, you see. The normal schmucks have to pay the $28 and their check gets returned to the payee without being honored.
First of all, among the few screw ups that I have avoided in my life is the bounced check, so their kind offer means little as far as I'm concerned. My strategy has always been, don't write checks on funds you don't have. A simple concept.
But heck, I don't write many checks anyway. I write one to Larry the Bug Man for $29.50 each month and one each to my two bowling leagues, about $80 each per month. Sometimes I pay for bowling in cash and Larry is the only check I write. Mrs. Sneed probably doesn't write any from her checking account. The debit card and bill pay have made checks near-obsolete, at least for us.
I suppose it is possible to overdraw using a debit card, but online account access makes that more difficult, assuming you check your account regularly.
I guess it kind of irritates me that we have substantial savings at this institution earning about 1% and yet they would stick me for $28 in the unlikely event we had a bad check or bad check-like event. This is why they get a bad name.
Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky
Dec 15, 2008
Rain is in our forecast and the incoming clouds created quite a dramatic sunset.
I don't like to brag or anything buy my credit union sent me a letter telling me that they will automatically cover any overdrafts in my checking account for a mere $28 a pop. Just because I am a valued customer, you see. The normal schmucks have to pay the $28 and their check gets returned to the payee without being honored.
First of all, among the few screw ups that I have avoided in my life is the bounced check, so their kind offer means little as far as I'm concerned. My strategy has always been, don't write checks on funds you don't have. A simple concept.
But heck, I don't write many checks anyway. I write one to Larry the Bug Man for $29.50 each month and one each to my two bowling leagues, about $80 each per month. Sometimes I pay for bowling in cash and Larry is the only check I write. Mrs. Sneed probably doesn't write any from her checking account. The debit card and bill pay have made checks near-obsolete, at least for us.
I suppose it is possible to overdraw using a debit card, but online account access makes that more difficult, assuming you check your account regularly.
I guess it kind of irritates me that we have substantial savings at this institution earning about 1% and yet they would stick me for $28 in the unlikely event we had a bad check or bad check-like event. This is why they get a bad name.
Things in this blog represented to be fact, may or may not actually be true. The writer is frequently wrong, sometimes just full of it, but always judgmental and cranky
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10 comments:
$28? That's a bargain. My bank charges $35.
Shessh.
$33. But I bet it goes up soon.
Dennis doesn't write checks. That's what Dennis has people for.
You've never had an overdraft in your whole life?! I've rarely gone below zero, but I wish I could say never.
ugh, don't even get me started.
The injustice here is that historically responsible customers get penalized for a rare but honest mistake in the same way as all the irresponsible people who actually think that they are entitled to check float and try to game the check clearing system. I was a payments lawyer at the Federal Reserve for a long time, and I can tell you that there are a lot of people out there who either don't know or won't accept that, hello, you aren't supposed to write a check if you don't have enough money *already in the account* to cover that check, plus all the other outstanding checks, debit card debits, and ACH transactions that are payable from the same account. These are probably the same people who make $45,000 a year but live in $500,000houses. Sorry for the rant -- this one hits a nerve.
I haven't the slightest idea what my bank charges for a bounced check. I did bounce one, but it was about 20 years ago, and I don't even remember now why it happened. I was in college and probably just wasn't paying attention.
Where they get a bad name is when someone writes ME a bad check, and my bank charges me $20. Huh? How is that my responsibility?
There really is no excuse for a bounced check. But I still know smart people who NEVER balance their check books!
Check? What's that?
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