Good question..... I mistakenly threw out an old checkbook..but the account still had $15 in it. About a year later, tons of bounced checks notices and collection letters started pouring in... Talked to the bank...closed the account, all would be taken care of. They're STILL on my report...being questioned as of today. Unfortunately, I've not the time to fully address this, but I will soon, and w/o MY signatures on those checks, it's impossible to even THINK they were written by me. just a relational experience
Your situation has the appearance of being a totally different type of situation to what I think that mr brown was talking about and what I intended to convey in reply to his post. First of all, when it comes to chexsystems, we should first of all consider that all states have a maximum limit on the amount of money that a merchant can charge for a bounced check. That amount is usually $25.00 per item bounced. Some states are as low as $15.00 per check. But every state has a law setting the maximum amount that can be charged by the merchant. A merchant contracts with a check collector to collect his bad checks for him. The check collector then contacts the writer of the check in an attempt to collect. He usually attempts to collect some additional amount of money above and beyond the face value of the check from the issuer of the check. My question is this. While it is acknowledged that the collector and the merchant have a contract between them, where is the contract between the collector and the issuer of the check? Ok. so there is no contract between the issuer and the collector in which the issuer agrees to anything or receives any thing of value. Let us suppose that's a question of little value or merit anyway since the average hot check writer has no idea that he cannot be forced into a contract with a 3rd party without his express consent. Can we be concerned at all with the fact that the only existant contract is the contract between the merchant and the collection agent and it is the obligation of the merchant to pay his collector for services rendered to him by the collector? And what about the poor merchant? How can we expect that he stay in business if he has to take money out of his profits to pay for someone's hot check? That won't work! All I can say for the poor merchant is that if he can't stand the heat then he had best get out of the kitchen. In otherwords, if the costs involved in accepting checks is too great then don't accept checks. Let's see where that little discussion goes. No contract, no service performed for the issuer of the check, no way to legally collect fees from the issuer of the check because the laws in most states only provide for the merchant to collect the extra money and do not mention the possibility of any 3rd party that I can recall of. It's been a while since I checked into that, so maybe I don't remember all the little details and someone will refresh my memory.
