BACS transfer changes

if they do charge for the new method it'll be very difficult to withdraw the existing one.

also if they do charge how will this be any different from CHAPS which can currently get money to a UK clearing account within about an hour? usually costs about £10-15

having said all that if banks do start to charge for it, it'll only take one of them to do it free and a lot of the others will follow to save loosing customers.

Ian

wrote

It'll be a bit slower (overnight / 1 day) and, presumably, cost a little less??

I agree. Although I hold no briefs for banks, they've got to make money somehow and I can see that we will end up paying charges on our current accounts and things like that which are currently free.

Rob Graham

Won't everyone go back to cheques if they start charging for electronic transfers?

cd

I occasionally use CHAPS and I would be prepared to pay for BACS(lite) if it serves my purpose (maybe a few quid). If the three day BACS remains free then I would use that much as I do now.

I'd expect them to start charging more for cheques - due to the increased cost of processing them.

I dont follow this at all. 90% of BACS payments are initiated by commercial concerns collecting Direct Debits and other business making automated remittances such as salaries. BACS is generally accessed by the submission of bulk data, in the old days by tape, now by direct connection.

Very few BACS transactions are initiated by private individuals and those that do are mostly via internet banking and the rest by standing orders.

I cant see many of those users going to the hassle of handwriting a cheque and then posting it in order to avoid a charge of what I reckon will just be a few pence. In fact I reckon most personal customers wont be charged at all.

In message , snipped-for-privacy@gmail.com writes

A) The cost will be much less

B) you wont be able to perform the transaction instantly. At the moment, if you want to initiate a BACS payments then you generally need to be making a huge number of payments or collecting a huge number of direct debits OR you are using Internet banking. There isnt a way of initiating a BACS opayment in the same way as intiating a CHAPS payment.

It wont effect the vast majority of customers who dont initiate BACS payments anyway.

Personally I find writing a cheque and putting it in an envelope much less hassle than the amount of jumping through hoops required to log on to my internet banking account and make a payment to someone.

Cheque payment:- Find cheque book (easy, it's always in the bag I take to work). Write cheque Put in envelope (often pre-addressed) Post (again easy, I do it as I go to work)

Internet payment:- Turn on computer and wait for it to start up, quite a while (OK, it may be on already) Start web browser and navigate to login for internet banking, it's rarely possible to actually bookmark the login page, you have to click at least one link. Log in to internet banking, non trivial nowadays, even if you automate the bits you can (which you shouldn't from the security point of view). Go to 'make payments' If it's a new payment set up a new payment which may take a while as you need the payee's bank details and have to fill them in, when you send a cheque this is either done for you on a paying in slip or the payee does it. Some banks don't allow you to use the new payee details for 24 hours so that's another slow down. Make the payment (phew!) Turn off computer if you're not going to use it again.

I do actually make some payments via the internet, mostly repetitive ones where the payment details are already set up, like payments to the Inland Revenue but for payments to individuals a cheque is far, far easier and quicker.

I agree with you wholeheartedly. I occasionally buy stuff on Ebay but only from sellers who say that they accept cheques. That way Ebay makes the seller's name and address available to you once the deal is closed.

A cheque can be faster, too. Because user jamesfollett has a 100 per cent fast payer positive feedback of *126 over some 150 transactions, once the cheque's in the seller's hand the following day, they often despatch the goods without waiting for it clear.

NB: I recently saw a Benq monitor in use (a brand I'd never heard of) and had been suitably wowed by its brilliant picture and overall good design features such as straightforward controls, and that it's virtually all screen with a narrow border frame. The computer shop in Godalming High Street thought delivery would be about eight weeks. A search of Ebay turned up several traders with 'buy now' options. The new monitor, paid for by cheque, was on my desk and working four days later and about three days before my on-line account showed that the cheque had been cleared.

It's hardly any wonder that there's a downturn in high street retail trading.

I left out one bit (for some cases), write a few things on a paying in slip, still often easier than the equivalent on the internet as much of it (like the account number and sort code) is filled in for you.

I was thinking mainly of person-to-person to person-to-business. Wouldn't the business have to pick up the tab for a direct debit transaction? Don't they have to pay for one anyway?

cd

But if your arent using BACS for free now, then all this doesnt effect you does it?

As an aside, my comparison of the above actions would be

Find cheque book (hard, never use it, Im very untidy, could be in house,office or car). Find Pen (very hard)

make out and insert payment slip so reci[pient knows its for the rtight account (surprised you dont do this)

Buy stamp.

Make special trip to post box.

Foir internet banking

Click on Shortcut (PC always on on my desk)

Enter password

Click on payments.

Takes two ticks to create recipient, shorter than fiulling in a remittance slip.

Click pay.

Log off

All done whilst eating sandwich.

Yes, but Banks do have a charge for paying Dds in the 'costings' but I doubt they would levy it.

What makes you think that BACS transfers are free now? Transferring £5000 from one deposit account to another costs £2 in lost interest, assuming that the transfer only takes 3 days. It could well take longer, for instance if a weekend was included.

It's more like £20-£25 these days, only worth it for greater amounts - and the amount from which it would be worth it to pay for CHAPS depends on your tax bracket, see

... cheque is lost in post, lots of hassle (Inluding additional payment charges for missing a payment) , or , cheque takes 2 days to arrive, cheque is banked, cheque takes 3 days to clear. Elapsed time before you are sent item, at least one week. You also omitted common mistakes such as putting last years date on cheques in the first few months of the year, omitting payee or amount, that lead to more delays and hassle.

You could write a similar list of things for making a cup of tea. Both take about 2 minutes and you are done. The cheque doesnt get lost in the post, the payment gets there without mail delay or screw up at the receivers end (they lose the cheque, pay it into the wrong account etc)

I'd recommend not turning computers on and off all the time you want to use them, you'll find they break far more frequently.

I suppose you dont make tea either then, obviously far too much hassle..buy kettle, get house plumbed (might already be I suppose) , fit taps, pay water company (by cheque so you'll have to wait a week at least), turn water on ...

Finally, every 3 cheques cost you a quid to 'process'. 30 cheques a year, thats a tenner you've literally thrown away.

X-No-Archive: yes In message , Tumbleweed writes

A specious argument. Doing the most mundane things in life incorrectly can lead to problems. Going for piss, for example. Just because it ends in disaster doesn't mean that the system is flawed even if it looks like the cistern on the floor.

Not in the case where those mistakes dont occur in an alternate system and you are comparing systems.

To continue with your analogy, if the alternative was a wholly tiled room with automatic sprinklers after you had left the room, then that wouldnt suffer from the problem that can occur with the first system.

Obviously mistakes can occur in the alternative system as well, but in the case of dates on cheques, you cannot make a payment for last year by putting last years date on, or forget to say who the payee is, or the amount, etc, since the online system wont allow it. SInce the entire argument is abouts whats 'easier' and 'quicker' even one single mistake on a cheque could override all the other advantages of cheques by the amount of hassle it would cause (due to the consequential spinoffs from that mistake which could not have occurred with an online payment)