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Comment by hydrogen7800 | Hacker News Reader

Many of the gift checks for my wedding were made out this way. It made it very inconvenient to cash them since there was not yet such a person by one of the names on those checks, and the bank wouldn't deposit them. They insisted the checks would have to say "Mr. OR Mrs." Who thinks of that when sending a wedding gift? Most annoying to me was that I had never heard of anyone having this difficulty before, but it must happen every day.

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The ATM check frontend is much less picky than the teller check negotiation frontend. And the backend generally doesn't care too much either. To my recollection, I've only had one check ever refused by the ATM backend, and that was because the issuer hadn't signed it (on accident... I got the check back, took it to the issuer and they signed it on the spot, no harm done). I have had ATMs refuse a State of California Warrant (like a check, but not because it's drawn on the State's General fund), but a teller took it, no problem.

UGH this reminds me I have one of those fricking Warrants, for 19 cents, sitting on my desk. I finally found out that mobile deposit can't handle them because they have no account number whatsoever -- merely a routing number and a check number, so the 'check processing' system can't make any sense of them.

(I need to deposit it because I want to get my full name and address out of the unclaimed property register, for obvious privacy reasons)

The warrant I had trouble with was also unclaimed property.

I recall depositing a warrant at an ATM in California with no problems, so it's worth trying, but the ATM I tried in Washington didn't like it.

Chase online deposit was fine with it for us. I'm pretty sure quite a few of them were "and" and some were probably "[me] and [my wife's completely made up name]". (She doesn't go by her legal name, first or last, though now that we're married she intends to go through the legal process to update.)

I deposited a few of these in Louisiana (can't remember if it was online or not but my account was originally opened in Oregon so who knows if that part of ACH is more familiar with them)

I still think it's crazy a first world country is using cheques regularly.

Well, that's what happens when all the other options were invented by companies that are scheming to scam a cut of every transaction -- not to mention checks are the only way that doesn't require the receiver to give some awful private company all your information in order to get paid.

Funny thing is, people think their bank account number is private, but it's printed on every check they write.

Yeah, one of those funny legacy things from the days when convenience and cost of storing alternate identifiers dictated designs. Just like how my SSN was printed on my school ID that I presented at the library and dining hall 20 years ago. NBD!

Btw by private info though, I just meant you need to actually create an account to use Zelle, PayPal, cash app, Apple Pay, etc. The account number isn’t as big a deal, just that it is annoying to have to make an account and agree to a 200-page EULA, with a random third party company you didn’t choose, just to receive some money you’re owed.

This is one of those secret versus private things that pops up now and then.

My bank doesn't charge any fees for transfers, and our EFTPOS fees are not allowed to be above what it costs the merchant. No private companies (beyond the bank themselves) have access to private information.

No, we don't use cheques. We use checks. Much better.

I did run into this with one teller at a bank we use. Wife showed them a copy of our marriage certificate on her phone and the teller said, congrats and that was that. We had 0 issues with online check submission though.

That's because online doesn't usually check the names, just the numbers. They wouldn't know unless you called in and told them, such as in case of an error.

Having had a bit of it with my wife (she changed her name) my policy is to make the check out to the person who is not changing their name.

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