Cash the Check Already!

1 month? I was expecting you to say its been 4+ months. I say wait another month and then bring it up.

Super annoying!! i think a friendly reminder is order. Or just ask them if they'd rather have cash or a gift card, instead.

I can't stand that either. I would call and ask them to deposit it. I have had to do this in the past and I am just polite and ask if they forgot about it. You can also just remind them that they only have 90 days to deposit it, after that it will expire.

I would definitely call. You could just say, "Just wanted to make sure you got the check" or "Wanted to make sure there wasn't a problem with the check I gave you, I noticed you haven't cashed it yet."

I am always super careful to cash checks fast now, but when I was younger I had no idea holding onto a check messed up people's checking balances. I think it took someone telling me to make me get it.

Just call them and ask very politely if perhaps they misplaced it.

Let them know that you are a stickler for keeping your checkbook balanced and would appreciate it if they could please deposit or cash the check this week.

There's nothing rude about it...

I have one out there for over two months. Irritating.

that reminds me that i still haven't cashed my Christmas check from my parents... guess i should get on that, eh?

but, to answer your question, i don't let it bug me... all my checks are logged into my quicken the minute they're cut, so just pretend that the money isn't there... are you sure that the payment was received? did you place it in their hand as opposed to mailing it? if placed in their hand, i wouldn't say a word about it, if mailed, i call and verify that payment was received.

If a gift - call to make sure it was received and not stolen.

If it was payment - don't call and enjoy the interest. It's on them to take care of their own financial house.

Just call and ask if the check has been received (if you mailed it) or if the account is paid in full. Hopefully, that will remind the person to cash the check.

My bank wrote a check to my neighborhood HOA through bill pay. When the HOA held it for a year the bank voided it. Fortunately I kept copies of everything because the HOA could have charged me a penality for paying late.

My old work would only cash checks once a month (they didn't have a 'scan&deposit' system, but instead all the checks were gathered up and deposited once a month). If something happened to circumvent 'deposit day' (illness, snow, etc.) or there weren't enough checks to make it 'worth' that person's time... checks would often be held until the next month.

It never really made sense to me... seems like the number of rubber checks would decrease with prompt deposit... but people have 6 months to deposit a check before banks are supposed to void them out.

LOVE technology. I can snap a picture of a check (front and back) with my phone and my bank deposits it right then and there.

I would give them a call. Just say, "I was balancing my checkbook and noticed the check I gave you for xyz hasn't cleared.. I juts wanted to be sure you still had it. " That will probably prompt them to get to the bank.

Typically banks won't cash a check that is 90 days old or older. You can call your bank and find out what their protocol is for cashing checks...

Although some banks don't pay attention to dates anymore...since they are all done electronically.

Call the person and let them know that you have an outstanding check in the amount of X - if it is not cashed in the next 7 days - the bank will not honor the check.

If they don't get back with you - pay the $5 or $30 dollars (depending upon your bank) to cancel the check so you won't have to worry about it.

I called a company and they said they never received it, then it cleared the next day after I sent them another. :(

You may as well contact the person. Because of dealing with my ex I found out from my attorney that just because he refuses to cash a check doesn't negate my debt to him. In other words if it is someone prone to annoying you they can come back whenever and as for the money. Which is what my ex enjoys doing. Grrrrrr

I would just ask if they accidentally misplaced it. Oh, one fun thing my attorney told me was I can deduct the stop payment fees from the amount I owe him. :p

Yeah, you can call them. I am horrible at cashing checks and people call me and tell me to cash the damn check. :) I dont find it offensive, just makes me feel a little lazy, but thats my fault. :(

Just call and say, "Hey, dont forget about that check I gave you, I see you havent cashed it yet."

Just call them. Some people do not go by the bank very often. Direct deposit has spoiled them.

Maybe they lost it or forgot about it?

Yes, call them and remind them to cash it!

That irritates the he$$ out of me. We run our company and I reconcile personal and financial daily.

All business checks we deal with are processed in a timely manner. I also have a statement on our checks that they are valid only 90 days to help give someone motivation to get to the bank.

The personal checks say to an individual, etc are a different matter. Such poor money management. What have I done: I have called or emailed and simply said, I reconcile my accounts often and I noticed the check I gave you has not cleared. I was just checking to make sure you received it. Of course that does not help much if you hand delivered it but I would mention it. Poor money management drives me nuts.

I'm often very slow about cashing a check. I'll put it in my wallet and forget about it. But it doesn't bother me if someone does it to me. I just consider it outstanding when I balance my checkbook. Not sure why it causes a problem for people. Your checking account balance should maintain enough to cover it whenever the check is cashed. If it's a huge amount - ie: $20,000 or something, then I think I'd ask the person bc it's poor cash management to keep cash sitting in a checking account. Otherwise, you're not losing much. Same difference to your bottom line whenever they do cash it. So I wouldn't call the person.

Oh....this so ticks me off!
My rent is due on the first, but I called my landlord and told them they would have my check on the 5th as it was my payday. I made arrangements for that a week in advance.
On the 3rd, there was a 3 Day Pay or Quit notice posted on my door.
I called them and asked them WTH.
They said it was just standard procedure and not to worry about it.
They didn't cash that check for over a month.
I mean, they gave me a formal written warning (which said the next step was the eviction process) and they didn't even cash my check when they got it.
I have lived here for over a year and paid my rent several times a couple of days after the first. They don't have a policy of charging late fees, they just want to be aware. It was always fine.
When they held my check, I was worried they were going to kick me out or something.
All I can say is it's a pain in the rump when people hold checks.

Just my opinion.

Personally I would leave it as an outstanding check and move on with my life. This is as long as it isn't for a bill that would accrue finance charges or go into collections.

some places send out a letter after 30 days reminding them, and also with a place to sign and fill out if they need a duplicate one if they lost the other one, and some also have a fee for this.

This is why I don't like writing checks.

Call the person and say "I was balancing my checkbook this morning and saw that your check hasn't cleared. Are you going to cash the check?"

OMG I find it funny that some of ya'll can go w/out cashing a check your given! LOL

It would annoy the heck outta me too J.

I'm a stay at home mom. I use a credit union for my money. Therefore, my bank isn't on every street corner and the location the credit union is not incredibly convenient for me. I have no other reason to go to a bank because I don't collect paychecks. I sometimes take a while to cash a check.

If I were you, I'd just deduct it from my balance in my checking book and not worry about when it actually gets cashed... NOW, if 6 months go by (usually the limit of the value of a check), and the funds are still not taken out, put the amount back on your balance in your checkbook.

My landlord does this, it takes her sometimes 2-3 weeks to cash the dang check.. by that time I'm writing another for next month's rent and not liking that a humongous amount may be pulled out at any giving time.

I think it is perfectly acceptable to call and nicely ask when they anticipate cashing the check.

I've been guilty of holding a check for a week or two or so (Used to bank at a bank that was out of the way - when college was in session I could drop it off but when I wasn't going that way, well, I just wasn't going that way! Now it is closer to home, and it'll still take a week or more before we get it deposited!)

I've always wondered why people don't use their check registers?? You know, write a check, deduct it from your balance, even though the money is *not yet* gone from the bank?

If you bank/write check according to what is in your account on any given day, you're bound to get in trouble if you've forgotten that there's a pending check out there!

Checks can be cashed up to 6 months later. After 6 months, they become void.

If it bothers you to have this check not yet cashed, you could ask them if they still have it, if they'd prefer cash, or just simply remind them that you notice it hasn't cleared yet and didn't want them to forget about it :-) I am not offended when people remind me (of course, I haven't had anyone call me up to chew me out and lecture me about not depositing a check promptly either!)

Ask them a bout it. I actually found a fat check a year later. But was asked and I had to tell them I lost it!

i'm the person that holds checks. i just dont go to the bank that often (twice a year) and want to make it worth my run. the check itself says its good for 180 days. so just assume it's been taken out and let it be. if it's not been taken out by 180 days i guess they didnt want you money bad enough. would you bee updset if you got someone a gift card or paid them in cash and found out they hadn't spent it or used it yet? i think it's the same thing.

I know it's out there so I let it go for a while, still have it deducted from the checkbook because you know they are going to cash it eventually. Now if it is holding up you closing out an accounting period, before it hits 60 days I would call and ask them if they would be cashing it soon.

That said, my contributions to my church tend to all go together about every 4-6 weeks. None go and then they ALL go.

I csh checks with a week or two, depending on my life. My parents....lose checks constantly. They are not very organized.

You can give them a quick call and say that you were balancing out your checkbook and noticed it hadn't been cashed. Blame it on the bank. "Just wanted to be sure the bank didn't lose it."

I was staying at my (future) in-laws' home (strange situation, but I wasn't even engaged to their son, yet.) in grad school for about 5 months, so I wrote them a check every month...they NEVER cashed them. On our wedding day, we got a wedding card with ALL of the checks torn in half. REALLY???? What? They wanted to see if I would say yes to him proposal and if not, they'd cash them all at once? I was living on nothing in grad school, and every dollar made a difference...sooooo frustrating.

Mybe they lost it and forgot about it. Ihad a friend who did that. For a year.

A month!?! I sometimes don't cash a check for 6 months or more. My various in-laws out of state would send $20 checks to our kids for birthdays and christmas, etc. We bank electronically, so it's a big effort for us to mail the check to the bank. We usually get around to it before the next birthday. Nobody called us. Now I wonder if they get irritated as well. Hmm.
Just let it go.

I would call and reming them. Chances are, it just slipped their mind.

It is perfectly alright to contact them and remind them if delay in cashing it is posing a problem for you. When I write a check I understand that it is negotiable for a certain amount of time and I don't spend the money that it was written for. It could be the next day or the next month or two months, but that money will be there because I know I have spent it - end of story. If this poses a problem, you can just tell them that you are attempting to balance your check book and noticed that the check to them is still outstanding and you wanted to make sure that there wasn't a problem.

.

This happened with the soccer club last fall. I wrote a $220.00 check to them in the first part of August. I saw the on our statement that the other $80.00 check was cashed...so stupid me assumed both checks cleared. A week before Thanksgiving I go online to check our balance and low and behold...I've got insufficient fund fees of $250.00.

I was furious...so yes...call them and no lies, no the bank hasn't cleared it....I would say please cash the check!

I learned my lesson the hard way...don't wait three months to make sure!

P.S. I will now pay them in money orders! And if they don't cash it in time..not my problem!

Its horribly rude to not cash a check within a week or so! I don't see any valid excuse for not doing so. IMO. I would call the person and ask them if they got the check . If not, you need to cancel it because of x,y or z. I would put at the bottom of your checks that they need to be cashed within 90 days or less if you want for them to be valid. GL

M

I would just call them to see if they still had it, or if it had been lost, as you noticed it hadn't yet cleared your account.

I lost a check from my mom once, and a few months later she asked me about it--I completely forgot she had even GIVEN it to me. She gave me a new one, and I ripped up her original when I finally found it a few months later.

If it is a biz deal, I'd ask them to cover any Stop Check fee that might be incurred, and would contact the bank to stop it & give them a new check. If it is a personal relationship check, I'd just phrase it as something like, "I hate to cancel the check & incur a fee if you think you have it somewhere...what do you think I should do" (assuming that they lost it).

I had a similiar problem a few months ago - my neighbors and I split the cost of a fence repair along our shared property line - they took FOREVER to get me the amount due (fence completed early Sept - I finally went over and dropped the check personally around mid-October) and they still hadn't cashed it come November!

I just happened to see them outside one day and asked if the amount of the check was ok since THEY HADN"T CASHED IT YET. They cashed it later that week.. :-)

Good luck - not petty and very annoying - I was sure they were going to cash it the minute the amount in my account dropped a dollar below the amount of the check. :-)

I remember receiving a check from a co-worker and she was financially strapped and was balancing her checkbook about two weeks later she asked me why I hadn't cashed her check. Well, I had it in my coat and had been carrying it around so when I went to the bank I would cash it.
Then again, I wasn't financially strapped and needed to count my pennies as she.

So perhaps one of the reasons the check is not cashed could be as I was at the time - not needing the money right away.

You have a different perspective on money when you have it then when you don't. Just my take on things.

The other S.

I would call them and tell them it hasn't cleared that they need to check with their bank to make sure it was processed. Sometimes a bank can loose a check after it is deposited. They may have lost the check too and that would give them an option to say that it is lost.

I would let them know so if they did in fact deposit it they can check. Plus if one of them was supposed to deposit it and it's still sitting in a wallet or checkbook somewhere they need the prompt to take care of it.

My son's daycare does that and it really annoys me since we pay weekly and sometimes it'll be 4 weeks later and a check still hasn't hit my account since they are not consistent with deposits (other times it's within one day of dropping off the check). My husband works in the oil industry so he's often gone for a couple months at a time so when he comes back in town, he doesn't realize what checks are out there and all, so it can be frustrating randomly having a second person using our account. So, I now just get money orders at the grocery store (less than $1 each) and use that for daycare so I don't constantly check my account wondering when the checks will go through (it just drives me crazy more than anything).