Deposit Checks To Your Bank By Taking a Photo

Pickens writes "The Mercury News reports that consumers will soon be able to deposit a check by snapping a photo of it with a cell phone and transmitting an encrypted copy to their bank. Although some critics contend paperless deposits are an attempt by the banking industry to eliminate 'float,' the standard one- or two-day waiting period between the time someone writes a check and the time the money is actually taken out of their account, actually remote-deposit capture started out as a way for big companies and financial institutions to process huge numbers of checks without having to ship them around the country. 'Our customers are becoming more and more tech-savvy,' said an SVP for mobile banking at Citibank. 'We're trying to support those people on the go.' Although the process adds a new wrinkle to concerns about fraud and the privacy of financial data, banks and the technology companies helping them say they have largely overcome these concerns. Another bank SVP said, 'For many institutions struggling to raise deposits and differentiate, this is an outstanding offering they can roll out inexpensively [note: interstitial]. It's a sticky product.'"

Comments

Checks

[sopssa]

Or what if US just stops using inferior checks and just wires money like rest of the world? It's also possible to even push money in to credit cards directly, in addition to normal bank wires. Checks are insecure, inconvenient and pretty useless in today's electronic world. For non-electronical purposes you can just use cash.

Re:Checks

[realsilly]

Good God, push your money into to credit cards directly? Are you insane? Can you imagine the fees the credit card companies can and would likely impose?

Your deposit is too small - FEE
Your deposit is too big - FEE
Your deposit is greater than your minimum payment we'll just apply your paycheck to what you owe us and here's a Fee for that service - FEE
Your deposit is not every week - FEE
We don't like who you work for, they are not in our network - FEE
Your direct deposit bounced - FEE

Ok so those are a little crazy, but if you look at what credit card companies employ already, those aren't that far off.

Re:Checks

[Lumpy]

That would mean forcing the banks to serve the customer instead of the shareholders.

Are you INSANE???????

customers are nothing but pests that must be tolerated.

Re:Checks

[Anonymous Coward]

You seem to have a pretty firm grasp of our banking system :D

Re:Checks

[realsilly]

Wire transfers cost $25 a transfer here.

Re:Checks

[AndrewNeo]

This is something I have never understood. Why on earth do normal people use banks when there are credit unions?

Re:Checks

[Lumpy]

All american ones.

If I transfer cash to a friend it costs me $25.00 processing fee plus a $15.00 transaction fee.

This is normal for american banks.

Granted I could use a credit card and pay interest on that but why should I do that. credit cards are for credit NOT bill payment.

I still write a check to pay my electric bill because the electric company charges an extra $3.50 for me to pay electronically.

It's all about screwing the customer, banks love to do that here in the United states. Over in europe they are more restricted when it comes to screwing people.

Re:Checks

[mdwh2]

Although useful, and I do often do that myself, it's a long way of replacing cheques in all situations:

What if I want to give someone money when I don't have an Internet connection? (Similarly with a wire - I can't believe that the OP of this thread thinks going into a bank is easier than just writing out a cheque, although maybe these things have different names in the UK to the US?)

Or what if I don't have the security keypad device thing that my bank requires me to use? Or I don't have access to the strong passwords on me at that moment? What if the bank introduces new security measures, and you can't access the website until then (yes, mad as it sounds, Barclays pulled this one on me, when they started requiring the aforementioned keypad device things).

What if the website's "down for maintenance"?

What about liability? In the UK, there have been cases of people paying the wrong person, and it's their fault because they're the ones who typed it in - the recipient legally is entitled to the money. If there's a mistake due to the bank person typing it in wrong, it's harder for them to argue this.

Give me something that satisifies all of those, and I'll throw away my chequebook. Remember that most of the pain for dealing with a cheque is on the recipient - what incentive do I have to take on the issues listed above, if I'm giving someone money? (Of course if someone's able to accept cards, that's fine, but this doesn't work for personal transactions and some small businesses like B&Bs.)

Re:Checks

[jollespm]

Might want to check out a credit union. They may not have as many ATM locations, but I get free bill pay, ATM fee reimbursement (I get the $2.00 back BoA charges to use their ATM!), and high interest checking from LGECCU. Any fees I do get charged like overdraft, are fairly reasonable compared to a big bank.

The fact that companies charge you to make electronic payments is criminal. Luckily, Progressive is the only company I deal with that does that to me.

Re:Checks

[clone53421]

Oh, and what's up with paying huge interest-rates on a "credit card" when most people have a much cheaper line of credit backed by their house anyways ? How does it make sense to borrow from the credit-card-company and pay 10% interest or something, when mortgage-rates are a third that ?

Eh? I pay -ZERO- interest on my credit card. I just pay the balance every month.

Credit cards are not loans and if you use them as if they were, you’re an idiot. It doesn’t make sense to borrow from the credit card company and pay 14% (or higher) interest. You aren’t supposed to.

Re:Checks

[businessnerd]

As someone who uses both a credit union and a bank, I recently had a discussion with the credit union about switching my checking over to the credit union. My first question was ATM availability and fees. This pretty much decided it. As someone who travels constantly for work, I need ATMs available without fees in most of the country. The credit union had plenty of ATMs where I live, but none outside of that area. While they offered 8 free transactions at out-of-network ATMs, that wasn't good enough for someone who travels weekly. On top of that, the actual ATM fee was higher than what my current bank charges. I don't get reimbursed for ATM fees, so this expense adds up very quickly.

The other factor was online banking. The credit union's web site is terrible and their online bill pay tools even worse. I pay all of my bills online and even send checks to individuals via the online bill pay (saves the cost of both checks and stamps). Not having decent tools for this is a deal breaker. Granted, the credit union is not all bad. They gave me a very competitive rate on an auto loan, but then at the same time, paying that loan is not as easy as it was when I had a loan with Volkswagen Credit. I hear a lot of people touting the superiority of credit unions over banks, but I have yet to see any evidence of this for my own banking needs.

Cheques?

[unixcrab]

Those are those paper thingies that nobody seems to accept these days aren't they?

Oh yeah, great idea

[Pojut]

Just what I want on my cell phone...a picture of a piece of paper that has my checking account number and bank routing number on it. ::eye roll::

Re:Oh yeah, great idea

[Lev13than]

Just what I want on my cell phone...a picture of a piece of paper that has my checking account number and bank routing number on it. ::eye roll::

Everyone you have ever given a cheque to already has your account number, bank routing number and home address. Despite the little lock watermark and "micro-printing", cheques are 100% non-secure and should be treated as such. At least the iPhone has a four-digit password to protect it...

Re:Oh yeah, great idea

[jittles]

USAA Bank app for the iPhone already lets you do this. You don't actually save the image to your phone, it is stored in RAM and then immediately transmitted over the air to the bank servers (hopefully encrypted but who knows?).

Re:Oh yeah, great idea

[Lumpy]

checks are supposed to have magnetic ink for the MICR code on the bottom.. Problem is that buying a drum of magnetic toner to print fake checks is trivial. and with scumbag companies like quicken selling blank check paper to anyone, you have a super easy way of faking checks with a $30.00 used laser printer and a $100.00 thowaway computer.

Shit scan someone signature and you can completely fake the check in gimp without effort.

Paper checks needed to be done away with 50 years ago, the greedy banks simple dont want to do wire transfers for free to each other, they love being able to rape their customers with those made-up fees.

Checks!

[OzPeter]

Another technology where the US is the world leader!

Go USA! Go USA!

Re:Checks!

[OzPeter]

Obviously you are traitor, commie, or even worse a socialist.

If by that you mean foreigner, then you are correct.

USAA has been doing this for years

[Not-a-Neg]

USAA has offered "Deposit@Home" for years. Instead of taking a photo you can just scan the check and upload it. The only problem is they require you to have a credit card with them as well to qualify for the service. Hopefully, if other banks offer this service for free than USAA will change that policy. I hate having to mail in checks and sit around for two weeks waiting for them to deposit it.

meh, should have used USAA

[TheDawgLives]

I've been doing this for months using USAA's iPhone app. When I showed my mom, she went out and got an iPhone and started using it. Before that I used their deposit@home service to scan checks on my computer. Beats driving to the bank just to deposit a check.

Scanning a check exists now

[yog]

USAA lets me scan a check for instant deposit using a Windows browser, a Java applet and an attached scanner.

I'm a Linux kind of guy and, sadly, I have not found a way to make it work on my Ubuntu and Suse systems. But, it works great with my Windows laptop and it's simply the next best thing to direct deposit.

Obviously, a good secure app for smartphones (hopefully one is coming soon for Android but they've only announced for iPhone so far) will be a step beyond the scanner approach.

I kind of like the idea that someone hands me a check, and by the time they have closed their briefcase I have already made the deposit. No more canceling. It would be interesting to see if they can determine whether the check is good or not, and send instant feedback.

The next step is going to be depositing cash. I would love to be able to quickly scan my cash into my account, and then tear up the paper money (honors system). Hmm; gotta think that one through a bit more.

I hate cheques!

[bsDaemon]

First off, why would people be critical of eliminating float?! This is the worst part of using cheques -- sort of like making a "credit" purchase on a debit card. If I'm paying someone, I want them to take the money out of my account NOW so that my balance updates immediately. Of course, no one really takes cheques anyway except for leasing offices and the like -- people who know where you live without a shadow of a doubt. I only ever write cheques for my leasing office, which is why I'm still on the same box I've had since I was 18... which reminds me, I sort of need to get some more.

Been using it for 6mos

[Anonymous Coward]

I have had this option with usaa.com for almost a year now, and it's GREAT. As for the photo, it is NOT saved in your phone, ever. Once the bank accepts the images, it instructs you to write VOID on the check and shredd it. Quite nice to be able to drop a check in within minutes of receiving it, and use it too!

Re:Why not all electronic? No really, why not?

[cyn1c77]

I mean this as a genuine question: why is the US so far behind Europe in this?

I have an answer for you in the form of another question: Is the US actually ahead of Europe in any aspect of life?

(And I am asking that as an American.)

Checks are "old school"

[oddaddresstrap]

I hardly ever use checks these days. Can I just take a picture of some cash and deposit it instead?

old news?

[horatio]

You can already do this at USAA Bank. My sister has had this option for a few years now. USAA has recently added the ability to snap a photo and make a deposit from your iPhone.

Digital Credit Union

[self assembled struc]

Not only do you get some sort of possible bizzare nerd cred for using DEC's old credit union, but just like USAA, you've been able to deposit via check for about 3 years now. Sure DCU has no snazzy iPhone app, but, damned if i've ever lived near one of their banks in my lifetime.

Pentagon Federal Credit Union

[WyrdOne]

We are in the process of rolling out this same sort of program at our company as well (as I've been building about a dozen servers to support it). We've had the ability to deposit by mail for ages and this is the next logical step.

With most of our userbase being military and deployed to locations where they cannot access any branch services at all. Our userbase has become tech savvy enough to support a system like this. The largest impediment to implementing a system like this has been having the tech easy enough to use a "non-geek" can perform the tasks necessary without needing a large amount of training.

To those saying "What if I want to deposit counterfit checks". Well several systems are in place to prevent or at least mitigate that damage. You are only allowed to deposit up to a certain amount via the system (and have funds immediately accessible), the checks are processed real-time and won't be accepted without several validity checks passing and the account money is being collected from also happens as close to real-time as possible. Remember, just cause you deposit a check doesn't mean it can't bounce, that money is not truely in your account until funds are transferred from the check writers account. If you have those funds available for use immediately, it's because your financial institution trusts you to now deposit bad checks.

The the comment above about "great, just what I want, images of checks on my phone". The application itself handles taking the photo and no local copy is retained on the phone after the process is completed. (The image of the check is still available on the company's servers for review just like if you mailed in checks or deposited them via our branches.)

Re:Why not all electronic? No really, why not?

[Pro777]

There is definitely one. Free public bathrooms.

Re:Why not all electronic? No really, why not?

[jimicus]

Yes. We still have the freedom to own a firearm,

I don't have that unless I get a license and deal with a whole lot of legislation.

choose where to live,

I can live anywhere I please in the EU. What makes you think I can't?

express religious and political opinions without being jailed,

I can do this. What makes you think I can't?

choose our own doctors,

I can do this. What makes you think I can't?

choose whether to buy health insurance,

I can, if I so choose, buy private health insurance. Though for some idiot reason, many private insurance policies don't cover diagnostic procedures and finding out what's wrong with you is half the battle on the NHS. There's no legislative reason for the private insurers to refuse to cover diagnostic procedures, they're just wankers like that.

and choose where to go to college-- this week anyway. Next week? Who knows.

I did choose where to go to college. As did my brother. In both of our cases, a major part of the decision making process was "at least 100 miles away from here".

Seriously, are you trolling or do you have some vision of Europe as being a dystopia where everyone is told what to eat, what to think and how to shit from cradle to grave?

Re:$25 to transfer money to a friend?!

[Jenming]

Internet Banking and Wire Transfers are different things in the US. If I want to pay a bill or transfer money to another person in the US using Internet Banking I can do so for free. Either the money will be transfered electronically using ACH, intrabank transfer or my bank will just write and mail a check to the person.

Re:$25 to transfer money to a friend?!

[dekemoose]

Banks used to make their money by loaning the money you deposit to other people at higher prices. Interest rates being what they are today it's hard to make the kind of profits that banks are accustomed to that way. They're far more likely to make money by charging various fees, paying you nothing for your deposits and investing your deposits in high paying (assuming they don't fail) risky investment opportunities. In spite of the promise of financial system reform this is very likely to continue.