Quicken compatible checks

I was looking into Quicken checks but they are way way way too expensive at 23 cents apiece!!!

Are there Quicken compatible checks that don't cost so much?

Reply to
az-willie
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Att $0.37 for a stamp and, say, $0.05 for an envelope. We'll ignore the cost of getting it to a Post Office and the cost of your time. The total is $0.65. Quicken BillPay is $9.95 per month. So the breakeven point is 16 checks per month and it is much, much easier and more convenient.

Reply to
Stubby

Intuit is indeed a huge ripoff.

I just ordered my second batch of Quicken compatible checks through Costco. They work fine and the price of 500 wallet size checks is $33.99 ($0.068/check) with an executive membership or $42.49 ($0.085/check) on a standard membership. BJ's and Sams would probably offer checks too. I've also seen Quicken compatible checks available through the ads in the coupon flyers in the Sunday papers.

Reply to
John

I just ordered somme new checks from

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On-line bill paying is indeed a bargain. But why pay for it? Most of the service providers who bill me (phones both land and cellular, utilities, credit cards, etc.) let me pay electronically at their web sites - for free.

Donald

Reply to
Doug Ellice

Yep. And for other Payees who do not offer the service, BankOne (now Chase) has offered free bill pay service from my checking account for at least a few years, and more recently from my credit card. Both services will pay anyone, either via auto deposit into the Payee's account or via paper check. I haven't looked at the credit card option, but that sounds pretty cool if one can build up airline mileage with auto pay expenses.

Reply to
Rick Hess

Stubby said on 8/14/2005 8:53 AM:

========I only write 3 or 4 checks a month ... everything else is on autopay.

Those checks don't get mailed but handed to the landscaper or grocery delivery guy etc. etc. Just minor day to day stuff a few times a month. I could write them out by hand but my handwriting is terrible and I often can't tell what I wrote the next day. So I like to print them when I can.

But I'm too stingy to pay Quicken 23 cents a check. That is a rip. I see folks are offering info on where to get some cheaper it appears.

Reply to
az-willie

The type of electronic bill pay you describe above is known as a "pull" type, as you are allowing your creditor to initiate taking money from your account. Some people aren't comfortable with that model and prefer the "push" type of electronic bill pay, where you instruct your bank to send the funds to the creditor.

Fortunately, there are many banks that provide this type of bill pay for free as well.

Reply to
Clark W. Griswold, Jr.

What was described is not necessarily a "pull". I get notices from the phone company, cell phone company, credit card company, and others about the amount due and the billing. In a couple of case it is a "pull" but there really is nothing I'm going to do about the amount of the electric bill pr water bill anyway. However in most cases they are just notifying me of the amount and date and I have can go in and explicitly authorize them to do the "pull" when I choose and for the amount that I choose.

We write almost no checks anymore, but occasionally there is some local organization or other where the best way to pay them is a check. I print my own checks using versacheck software and check materials.

Bernie

Bernie

Reply to
Bernie

We write almost no checks anymore, but occasionally there is some local organization or other where the best way to pay them is a check. I print my own checks using versacheck software and check materials.

I can't tell you what the cost of the versachecks is, but it isn't much. The first time I bought a package with the checks and the software. Eventually bought a refill of check material. That was back in the says when we actually did still pay some bills by check. But for the last few years we've written zero to a couple of checks per month, usually zero, and the versacheck materials we have are probably going to last a lifetime.

I only print two of three pages of checks at a time. There are three checks to a page. If we ever move, or want to change the background picture that we print on the checks it is easy to do. When we changed banks a couple of years ago it was easy to print checks for the new bank and to print checks for the old bank while the accounts overlapped.

I'm pretty sure the Versachecks can be formatted to accommodate Quicken, but for any checks that we write regularly enough to bother printing from Quicken we've switched to online payments. We don't use our bank's check payment system at all - don't know what the fee is at Washington Mutual, but it isn't worth any fee since it can be done for free.

We used Intuit's check writing service many years ago, but on two occasions the recipients didn't get the checks and getting the problems resolved at the Intuit end was horrific and we quit using them. But that was a long time ago.

Bernie

Reply to
Bernie

Discover is now offering "auto bill" -- I just noticed when I went to pay my bill a few days ago. Most of the other companies automatically pull from my checking account or (preferable to me) a credit card. (I like to get that cashback bonus from Discover.) Some even allow me to change how I pay on their web site, all free. For the couple small companies that don't participate, I use my credit union's bill pay service which costs just $0.25 per bill paid. Soon they will offer Quicken Direct Connect. It's all set up on Intuit's end, just waiting for something on the Credit Union end. Although my checking account doesn't earn interest, it also has NO FEES. So I keep money in an insured money market account and transfer if necessary. (Paycheck is auto deposited to checking account.) The remainder of my emergency funds are at Emigrant Direct, still no fees. I love it.

Regards,

Margaret

Reply to
Margaret Wilson

I tried Versacheck a few years ago but all of the checks had to be hand coded (all of them returned with a white strip of paper on the bottom) because the numbers on the bottom were printed using conventional toner and couldn't be read by the bank. The cost of the MICR toner cartridge would have quickly eliminated any savings.

Reply to
John

Ifr you are considering Versacheck & the like, you should know that they have finally admitted that printing checks using non-magnetic ink is not acceptable for most banks, and it appears that the new Check21 regulations prohibit non-MICR ink now for everyone. They are printing on the latest Versacheck packaging that you must use Versacheck ink, which is MICR compliant. This presumes that they make ink for your printer...

Reply to
Clark W. Griswold, Jr.

We've never used, or even considered using, MICR ink. The processing depends on the banks involved. Some use MICR readers, some use optical readers. If manual encoding is necessary at some step in the routing of your check from wherever it is deposited until it gets back to your bank, the manual encoding is done there. Rarely would your own bank ever be involved in adding the encoding strip.

Washington Mutual doesn't care if the checks are MICR encoded. Neither did the Credit Union we used to use. But one bank we checked with several years ago said they would charge 25 cents or something like that for every one of our check they had to encode. We chose not to open an account with that bank. As banks come on board with the new Check21 process only the first bank actually handles the check, the others all get a paper copy which has no MICR coding, or they get an electronic image which can be printed without MICR ink.

In the case of some businesses, they do any necessary endorsing/encoding themselves and simply tell their banks what they've done. They got a better deal from the banks by doing that and with high volume it paid. At least that was how it was done at several large companies I worked with as a consultant. The banks never actually handled the checks, other than to turn them over to the FRB. I don't know how that process may have changes with Check21. I guess the company would create the electronic image and not even give the original check to the bank at all.

Bernie

Reply to
Bernie

Fascinating. I checked their website and if you simply look at any of the check writing products it says: "Checks work with all banks VersaCheck Silver Express automatically prints all the elements necessary for your checks to be accepted by any bank in the US or Canada, including your bank's stylized code number (which includes your account number) on the bottom of the check. VersaCheck Silver Express also prints your bank's name and address as well as your own, and even prints sequential check numbers on your checks and in the code line."

But if you're persistent and click on enough links on their website you find something that says: " On October 28, 2004 new check legislation called Check 21 became effective. Check21 automates check processing by the Federal Reserve, requires checks to transfer between banks electronically, and may accelerate the time it takes checks to clear from days to just hours. Banks and retailers will use MICR check readers to scan paper checks into an electronic data stream causing MICR ink or toner to become mandatory for processing and scanning checks at banks and retail."

So far I haven't had any problems, but if I read that and didn't already have the software and check paper I wouldn't buy it now. Not even so much that I wouldn't want to buy their ink cartridge, but I wouldn't want the hassle of changing cartridges whenever I wanted to print checks, and I wouldn't leave their expensive cartridge in all the time.

As I looked at the information about Check21 I saw that it usually refers to the MICR line, much more clearly than for the need for MICR ink on that line. It is more like they use the term MICR line to describe the location and content of the line. So perhaps there is some flexibility for the future. But for now I'd pass on VersaCheck for home use for a new user.

By the way, the only time I've ever had a problem with a VersaCheck was at the service desk of a grocery store where she ran the check through a counter-top MICR reader and of course it wouldn't work. She couldn't understand why, not matter what I explained. I used a bank debit card instead (debit cards were newer then and it was the first, and still just about the only, time I've ever used the debit card.)

Bernie

Bernie

Reply to
Bernie

Well, I am not talking about auto-pulls, though they're fine for bills you are unlikely to dispute and always better pay on time, such as a utility bill or a mortgage payment.

But what I do is pay each bill, if and when I want, by telling the website to pull this one payment from my account. Why any rational person would care whether they tell the bank website to pay the company, or the company website to go get the money from the bank is beyond my comprehension.

Indeed, that is what a written check is: permission given to the payee to go get the money from the bank. A pull.

I've seen people online say that they're afraid to give their bank routing code and bank account number to a stranger. I delight in telling the morons that both are on their checks, and that they've been handing out checks to total strangers all their lives....

Doug

Reply to
Doug Ellice

Follow this link

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and click on the gold-colored oval with "Check 21" written in it. That statement leads me to believe that MICR encoding is mandatory for Check 21 implementation. Which puts paid to the old story of writing your annual IRS check on the side of a live hog.

Reply to
Mike B

What about transition time? People sometimes buy lots of checks in advance. So wouldn't it make sense that a reasonable period be allotted to give people time to use up their stocks of checks?

Reply to
D Persica

The Check21 rules were published several years before they went into effect. Presumably that was sufficient transition time....

Reply to
Clark W. Griswold, Jr.

I've ordered from EiPrinting

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several times and been happy with the results (less than half the cost, too).

No connection, just a satisfied customer.

Gary

Reply to
Gary E. Ansok

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