I’m not sure what the plans are, and I know they are going out of fashion but will cheques be processed faster than legacy banks? A Lloyds to Lloyds cheque clears instantly, but anything else takes 4 working days.
I assume Monzo > Monzo would be instant (should you ever offer cheques) but what about other babks? I still receive the ofd cheque from elderly customers, which is where this problem happens.
Have you used the instant deposit machines in branch? They can clear in 2 hours
I would assume Monzo either do not accept cheque deposits or would sign up to someone like PayPoint to accept cash and cheque deposits?
So a cheque from a Natwest account will clear within 2 hours of depositing through the machine in branch, is that correct? I’ve not tried that, no, I usually pay them out of hours through the ATM or if it’s a Lloyds cheque I will go to the counter as it will clear instantly.
I think the PayPoint option would be much better, whilst I understand that cheques are a bit out dated, they are still used a lot. Cash needs to be deposit-able too, some folks will take cash out for a night out and then have some left that they want back in their account, the same could be said for birthday money.
There was talk, however, of being able to pay in cheques using a photo, I think this could be a great feature too, but it wouldn’t work for cash, unfortunately 
Considering it takes me 2 or 3 months to pay a cheque in I shouldn’t really worry about how quickly they clear. That said, quicker clearing of a cheque would be a nice thing to have.
I believe so. Try it out next time and see how long it takes.
I think I will, no doubt it will now be months until I get one!
On further investigation, it appears there will be a shake up of cheque clearing next year anyway, as found on Lloyds website…
Cheques are changing in 2017
In 2017, cheque clearing in the UK will undergo a fundamental change. Cheques will clear much faster and customers will have greater choice over how they pay in cheques. This is because instead of exchanging physical cheques, banks will exchange digital images of cheques.
Development of the new system is underway and in 2017 we plan to introduce new ways to pay in cheques, such as using smartphones. We will also upgrade the way we process cheques at our branches.
More details will be provided as we get closer to making the changes.
Yeah I didn’t know that was public knowledge yet. Ah well. Yeah we are currently trying to get it to clear in like 30 mins.
That’d be sweet in all fairness!
Yeah it would but don’t take my word for it. It’s still not been done and relies on all banks to cooperate.
That’s the main problem, they don’t like playing together! We shall see what heppens 
This is an industry wide project that all banks are involved in. This first step introduces the swapping of images of cheques to allow faster clearing. It should reduce clearing time from 6 days to 2 days. It’ll be phased in from early in 2017 and all banks should be on the scheme by October 2017. I think from there they’ll look to reduce the clearing time further as part of this introduced a central clearing hub.
Currently, depending on who you bank with and the value of the cheque, some will give you access to the funds before the cheque has cleared officially, but in reality a cheque not issued by the same bank, will still take 6 days to clear fully.
I haven’t sent or received a cheque in the last year but to my knowledge, it’s HMRC’s favourite form of payment for tax rebates. They’re decades behind!
HMRC always send me my rebates by BACS and real quick too
No idea what I’m doing wrong with them then. That’s odd.
Maybe you submit tax returns on paper. I do them electronically and enter bank details near the end of the submission ensuring I put a tick in the box saying I want repayment of any overpayment, they then seem to send me my refund in a few days straight into my bank account, often the money even arrives before the email or letter telling me I will be getting a refund
I’m not self employed. It usually happens when I change jobs and the previous employer is too relaxed at providing a P45 
I fill in an annual self assessment form every year weather PAYE or self employed and even if they have written to me telling me I don’t need to 
useful when employers make the odd cock up
Seconded, I get payments via BACS too. Last time I got a cheque from them was 2004.
I don’t personally use cheques, but there are a fair amount still processed (over 500,000,000 in 2015).
A big use case for them seems to be school clubs and univeristy societies etc.
My nan still pays the milkman by cheque…but I suspect that might be a use case with a limited lifespan!
HMRC will now refund via BACS but only if you do your tax returns online