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"Check" cashing shouldn't even exist. Most of the western world has functional electronic transfers and bank accounts with no minimum fees. At home in Australi
by Veratyr 10y ago
"Check" cashing shouldn't even exist. Most of the western world has functional electronic transfers and bank accounts with no minimum fees.
At home in Australia, all it took for anyone in the country to send me any amount of money within around a business day (soon instantly) and for free was two numbers: my BSB (bank branch number) and account number.
Getting a bank account was essentially free (no fees if you deposit at least $2k/month or are under 18, a student or qualify for low income government benefits) and as a result pretty much everyone had them and used them. I'd actually only seen a "check" once in my life and it came from my grandmother. Employers, friends, parents, everything really was electronic.
The US for some reason is way behind the rest of the world here. The answer isn't to force people into the ancient and backwards banking system, it's to update it so that they can and want to use it.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- callmeed 10y agoThe US has a very large population of people known as the "unbanked" who cannot/will not get a bank account. Reasons include immigration/ID status, history of writing bad checks, bank levy, etc. They must use check cashing services, pre-paid debit cards, etc-often with high fees. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unbanked https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unbanked
- Veratyr 10y ago> Reasons include immigration/ID status, history of writing bad checks, bank levy, etc. The first can be a legitimate issue (though your link says the majority of the unbanked are American-born), the last two should be resolvable by modernizing the banking system by removing the outdated checking system entirely and offering basic accounts without fees/minimums (at least to low income individuals), bringing the system in line with the rest of the civilized world.