✅ Cheque Imaging 📱

Was it mandated that the big 4 groups had to provide mobile cheque imaging?

I find it odd that they have it whilst some of the bigger banks outside the big 4 groups haven’t bothered (such as Santander and Nationwide).

I think more as they’re closing branches like no tomorrow they had to put something in place to help customers not lose them.

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No. It’s simply to gain a competitive advantage (and lower costs), that some banks decided to introduce in-app cheque imaging.

They also all support paying in cheques via the Post Office…

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I pay in to my NatWest account at the post office, then transfer over

They support cheque imaging

Are your cheques over the limit for paying in via the app :thinking:

No, but I can’t do cash via the app :joy:, I wasn’t referring to cheques, could have worded it better

Max you can pay in via the app is £500, my NatWest account is the only account I have a cheque book for

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Exactly what happened to me and I haven’t looked back since.

I now just find the constant requests for cheque imaging amusing rather than frustrating!

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Agreed, hopefully they will eventually!

I thought about doing that, but then decided to leave them in both because my earlier post had initially included them (and I was quoting it) and because I wanted to make it clear that Clubcard Pay+ doesn’t allow money to be paid in via cheque imaging. That’s probably obvious though so I think you are right!

I’m sure you are not the only one, and I’ve made this same point in the past. I can only assume it’s something Monzo are factoring in and they must have estimated that the cost of developing cheque imaging support is still too great to be worth it. Eventually, as it becomes more of a standard feature, I think they will end up offering it to ensure they continue to appeal to a wide range of users.

No, not specifically.
However, what did get mandated by government was the closure of the old paper-based cheque clearing system. This was separate from the introduction of app-based imaging, but it did mean that all of those banks had to join the ICS (Image Clearing System) to continue processing cheques. Since they were all clearing banks, they were not likely to simply drop cheque support.

They therefore had no real choice but to join the ICS and start clearing all cheques via images, instead of on paper, and once this was done it was only a relatively small amount of extra work to add in-app imaging support for the initial image capture.

As @Carlo1460 alludes to, in the context of political pressure and discontent over branch closures, adding app support was also a good way to “throw a bone” to people who used cheques a lot and justify further branch closures by allowing banks to say that there was “no need” for branches to pay in cheques.

That’s another thing that the traditional banks do to “allow” for branch closures. It’s effectively the price to pay for them to avoid having closures blocked by regulators.

That’s what Monzo will be afraid of others doing, eventually, if people really want this feature.

I suspect that only a fairly small proportion of their customers so far are bothered about cheques, but as they start to pick up customers from a wider demographic as they continue to grow it may become more of a problem.

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Just wanted to add to this as I started to receive monthly cheques and the Monzo posting way seems like a nightmare. Because of this I opened a Barclays account in 10 min, payed in my cheque with taking a picture of it and in about 20 min I have the money on my account.

Seems like Monzo is really behind on this one, which is a shame

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I think you will find there is a lot of agreement with your last sentence. R-

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Behind would imply that Monzo are slow to implement things that people want, which isn’t the case.

Monzo did the research to implement this years ago, but made a business decision not to do so based on waning usage particularly amongst the customer demographic.

I haven’t received a cheque for years, and suspect that’s the case for most people, so instead engineering resources were allocated to things that more customers would potentially use.

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A lot of people ask for cheque imaging. Its hardly an unwanted feature and is probably more useful than some of the other features that have been released.

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Lots do on here, but most people don’t or won’t use it.

I doubt it will ever happen, cheque use is only going one way.

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There aren’t a lot on here asking for it compared to how many customers Monzo have.

Also, I voted for it because sure why not :man_shrugging: If I do get a random cheque one day it would be nice, but from a business perspective is building something like this for customers to use once or twice a year (if that) worthwhile.

I do think that it will come one day, but there are far more important things to be allocating resource on that are more beneficial in my opinion. So it’s likely on the “nice to have” list.

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I can’t remember the last time I got a cheque for anything.

I probably only get one a year, unless I get a tax refund, then it’s two. Many more than I write. R-

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Average 1-2 a month for me as DVLA refuse to switch to bank transfers. Just pay into Starling instead as good cheque imaging.

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Two a year from a relative who lives abroad. Prefers something ‘to drop out of a card’ rather than do a bank transfer. I’ve received five from banks in the last 18 months relating to unasked for refunds due on various financial products, which I’ve just used another bank for.

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Just being nosey but why are the DVLA paying you every month?

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DVLA do bank transfers for most things now. You just need an online account or to give them the details on the application / form.

Otherwise they default to cheque.