I currently do not accept checks for payment. I have had a few people ask to pay that way so I am trying to decide whether it is worth the risk to do so.

With my current methods, visa/mc/amex/discover/paypal, I know payment is there and has gone through.

My concern is that checks, although put through a verification system such as telecheck, do not authorize the amount at time of purchase rather the actual withdrawal occurs when the client's bank receives the electronic check request or physical check (although rare...some still have to print a check out do to a particular banks policy).

It can take about a week to be sure the check actually cleared, and if it doesn't, now you have an issue.

Do any of you currently accept checks, and if so, what amount of them have you had denied? Is it worth the risk to utlilize this payment method?

For those who do, what vendor do you use? There are so many out there it would be impossible to list them here.

The more I think about it, the more I lean away from it. I do want to provide my clients with a payment solution that works for them, but I also don't want to spend half my time tracking down those checks that don't go through.

Any thoughts or suggestions? Thanks.

We accept checks and don't have any problems. Some people prefer checks simply because they like proof of purchase (and most wish to have an invoice sent out).

People that write checks know how long it takes to clear, so I wouldn't worry about making them wait before you credit their account.
As far as fraud goes, I'd say checks are safer than CC's.
We have no problems taking checks.

Well, why can't you accept e-checks?

There is a misconception that all e-checks are instant payment. While most are, there are the stray banks out there that still require a physical, printed check be used. For instance, with a particular cc company, you can call and do a payment w/check over the phone. In most instances, the electronic transaction will suffice. But there were still banks that required the paper form and in those instances, a check had to be printed, then sent. This happened more with credit unions than anything.

The issue is, at least with that bank, it does not authorize the amount to see if it is available as a credit card would. It would query the telecheck database to look for problems, if nothing was there, the payment gets processed. My credit union used to be one of the ones that did not accept the e-check, and since they still return the checks, a check had been printed by the cc company then cashed. I really don't think there are too many out there anymore with that restriction.

It appears, at least so far, that taking checks is not the risk I had envisioned it to be. Do you have any suggestions on good companies to use?

Our policy is only to take checks from business accounts. It's worked pretty well for us. Since we are pretty high end on our dedicated servers 80%-85% are corporate clients who are used to paying by a physical invoice and check.

We have taken checks from individuals but we have also required them to provide a valid credit card. This has seemed to work pretty good. You have to wonder about someone that wants to pay by check but can't give you a credit card. We use it for verification purposes only.

We accept checks and most of our clients prefer it.

I think that if you were to take checks, they would need to be from business clients only. Also make it abundantly clear exactly when payment is to be remitted to you, and if they fail to send a payment by X date, their account will be suspended. If you know that it takes checks 1 week to clear, then have them send in their payment a week and a half early. This will put them in line with your other clients.

-Steven