In an article in the Telegrpah's finance section the point is made that the proclamation that the bank cheque is dead may have been premature. Britain's affection for writing cheques may be diminishing but it is still vastly more popular than online transactions.
In her article Myra Butterworth, Personal Finance Correspondent, points out that cheques remain a far more popular choice among consumers despite steady growth in the number of payments made online. Figures show they are used in six times as many transactions as online payments, raising questions over the decision to abolish the chequebook.
She goes on to say, “The cheque remains far more popular and widely trusted than online transactions. People are quite right to be sceptical about online transactions given the problems of identity theft associated with them. How can the banks argue that the cheque is dead when there were over 1.4bn payments made by cheque in Briton last year alone?”
My experience with many small businesses and self employed suppliers is that they will not give their bank sort code and account numbers to enable online payments to be made, and they cannot accept payment by debit card. In these circumstances, when I am in Spain and want to pay a UK supplier for work done sending a UK cheque is the the slow but only option if they won't give the bank details because of fear of fraud.
Telegraph
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