• Home Equity Loan   • Home Refinance Loan   • Home Purchase Loan   • Second Mortgage Loan   • Debt Consolidation Loan
Home Equity Loan Store «A website where you can find the lowest interest rates on home loans with absolutely free quotes from multiple lenders»
::

How Check 21 Affects You


The Check 21 Law is the new federal law for financial institutions and has taken effect last October 28, 2004.

Before the Check 21 law was enacted, your paper check had to be physically transported from where the check was paid out before it could be deposited to the financial institution. Now, even if it has always been prudent for you to keep money in your account to pay for the checks you've issued, this law makes it imperative.

Here are some of the other effects The Check 21 Law will have on you and fellow consumers.

You will no longer receive the original paper checks you issued, as your bank won't have these.

The probabilities of your checks clearing sooner have increased. If you don't have funds to cover this amount, your check will bounce. So don't make out a check when your checking account has insufficient funds, you'll be severely penalized.

On the minus side is, you will not be able to access the funds you've issued a check for, as the new law doesn't include shorter check hold times.

Because of the shorter time in process the checks, your banks will be able to save money in processing your checks, but they are not required under the law to share these savings with you.

For each kind of copy, your check will have different rights attached with it. For instance, Check 21 has created a new paper copy of an electronic image of a check and is called the "substitute check." This substitute check can be a legal equivalent of the original check, and right attached to this, is that only a substitute check triggers your right to recredit of disputed funds.

The regular copy of a check does not have this same kind of protection. If you ask for a copy of a check, your bank can send you an ordinary copy instead of this special kind of copy which triggers legal rights and protections unless you specifically ask for the substitute check.

A second bank other than your issuing bank can have your original check and under this law, has the right to decide if it will keep or destroy your check. Before enactment of Check 21, your own bank could decide how long they should keep your original checks, if you didn't get these back together with your monthly statements. Under Check 21, the bank of the person you wrote the check to may decide when to destroy your check.

Under the Check 21 law, you can have funds of up to $2,500 recredited to the your account in 10 business days if the check is paid twice, paid for the wrong amount, or otherwise paid in error. However, a gray area exists, does this new right apply when a paper substitute check is used in the processing of the check but is not returned to the consumer? The regulations apply this recredit right only to the consumer who was provided with a substitute check. If the check was electronically processed by all the banks it was routed through, and the consumer was not provided with a substitute check, then the check remains under state check law.

If you want to safeguard your rights, you can request for a return of "substitute checks" you issued together with your monthly checking account statements. One possible difficulty lies in the amount you may pay in getting these checks back, change banks if these are too high!

In essence, what the Check 21 federal law has done is shorten the gap financial institutions take in processing checks. This new law has enabled financial institutions to scan paper checks and to send images of these same checks for electronic processing. This law is an efficient and faster way to process check payments.

If you need information that is more detailed about your rights on the Check 21 law, access the Federal Reserve Bank website and request for these materials:

Consumer Guide to Check 21 & Substitute Checks and what you should know about your checks.

John Thomson is webmaster at business personal checks where check information is a click away. Specializing in cheap personal checks.


MORE RESOURCES:

More Personal Finance Daily stories
MarketWatch - 13 hours ago
"A good contrarian, though, will note that just when things look darkest is where we usually find the turning point." We're just getting started. ...


Mutual Funds & Personal Finance
Investor's Business Daily (subscription) - 14 hours ago
BY PAUL KATZEFF In a troubled market, the defensive consumer staples sector has outperformed all others. That's boosted Fidelity Select Consumer Staples ...


Yodlee(R) Announces Availability of Over 11000 Financial Data Sources
MarketWatch - Nov 18, 2008
The Yodlee Data Engine powers Yodlee's most recent innovations, including Yodlee PersonalFinance(TM), (the industry leading personal finance management ...


MONEY MAIL - BEST FOR PERSONAL FINANCE
Daily Mail, UK - 7 hours ago
Money Mail has won a high-profile award for its unsurpassed coverage of personal finance. The Daily Mail was named newspaper of the year at the Personal ...


Personal finance: Adding insult to injury, here come capital gains
Fort Worth Star Telegram, TX - Nov 15, 2008
AP Mutual-fund investors reeling from losses in the stock market may face another hit next month: capital gains tax liabilities on their sinking funds. ...


New Zealand Herald

Business writer David Chaplin blogs on personal finance
New Zealand Herald, New Zealand - Nov 17, 2008
I was at a conference last week where a woman stood up and blamed the press for creating the global financial crisis (or "the GFC" as insiders now refer to ...


Personal Finance: Payroll deduction is convenient way to get coverage
The Daily Advertiser, LA - Nov 17, 2008
A reflection of the changing economy of the last decade can be found in the changing attitudes many people have toward life insurance. ...


Personal Finance Roundup
The Consumerist, NY - Nov 17, 2008
By freemoneyfinance , 4:22 PM on Mon Nov 17 2008, 18 views 4 Common Resume Blunders [Yahoo Hotjobs] "Keep yourself in the running by avoiding these resume ...


Yodlee supports over 11, 000 financial data sources
Ecommerce Journal, MA - 11 hours ago
It powers Yodlee recent innovations that includes Yodlee PersonalFinance (the industry leading personal finance management solution) and Yodlee PayItAll ...


Personal Finance: The importance of savings
Business Mirror, Philippines - Nov 16, 2008
The global financial crisis has hit hard consumers in many countries. In the US, retail sales fell for a fourth-straight month in October, ...

Personal-Finance - Google News

Home Equity Loan | Home Refinance Loan | Home Purchase Loan | Second Mortgage Loan | Home Improvement Loan | Debt Consolidation Loan | Loans | Leases & Leasing | Personal Finance | Mortgage Refinance | Debt Consolidation | Debt Relief | Finance Resources
© 2006 Home Equity Loan Store | Personal Finance Information | Personal Finance Articles