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What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

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Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#201

Post by lotsofpulp »

Scoundreller wrote: post #121
grecy wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moving from Australia to Canada/US felt like going back in time 20 years when it came to banking. Even ten years ago in Australia I could do more with my online banking than I can today in North America. Checks are for what now?

I use checks to pay vendors I don’t like, like the for-profit power utility my building forces me to use. I have stamps to use up, and it costs them probably $7-$10 to handle it.

There is no way depositing a check costs $7 to $10 for any decent size business as they’re already probably handling checks. If anything, a check payment is cheaper as it’s more secure for the recipient in case of a dispute.

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#202

Post by kalleboo »

mattmcknight wrote: post #182
Symbiote wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm guessing, but I think most people probably give the electric company permission to pull the money from their account (direct debit) rather than reviewing the bill and "pushing" the money every time. There are very strong guarantees in the individual's favour if the company makes a mistake.

Yes, having them control the amount and timing of the transfer is exactly what I am trying to avoid. I can easily set up direct debit, but it has led to too many erroneous and poorly timed withdrawals.

In Sweden we have an e-billing system where your bills show up as PDFs in your internet bank and then you hit accept or deny (and they go in a queue to pay on either the due date or a date you pick). You can also set it to auto-accept new bills from the same company if you want to emulate how direct debit works (with the added benefit of having a period of time between the bill coming in and the due date to verify the amount is right)

If you want to stick to paper bills, they all have the receiving account number and customer reference number so they can be paid manually via a transfer.

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#203

Post by gpvos »

mattmcknight wrote: post #63
itcrowd wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Every other form of payment online is “pull" Sorry, but if I transfer funds to a friend from my banking app, how is that "pull"? If I send you money with PayPal, that's not "pull". If we settle our debt using e.g. TransferWise, that's not "pull"..? I don't get your point. There are plenty of "push" methods.

Can you pay your electric bill with those?

Yes, you can. However, since the last few years, the electricity company has started to charge something (about € 1,50 per month I think) for that. (Netherlands)

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#204

Post by gpvos »

Faaak wrote: post #151
orf wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The US has 4,909 banks ... This necessarily makes setting up inter-operation between banks more complicated. The EU has 6,250 banks though. Each with different countries. With 28 different languages, cultures and governments, with far more differences than the states in the USA. You're really arguing that it's harder to unify that in the homogeneous USA than it is in Europe? Come now.

And FYI: they all "talk" SEPA. You can wire money anywhere in europe (+ switzerland and some other countries) overnight for next to nothing (<1 USD).

...as long as it's in euro. In other currencies, you may get lucky, you may not. I recently got charged € 6 for a payment from euro to zloty.

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#206

Post by [deleted] »

Animats wrote: post #176
baddox wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ACH is not a common jargon term It’s not jargon at all, is it? It’s just literally the proper name for the specific payment network. I thought jargon is industry-specific slang terms for concepts that could otherwise be described with less industry-specific terms. There is no simpler or clearer way I’m aware of to refer specifically to ACH. As for it being common, if you work as a developer on any web products that…

> ACH is not a common jargon term It is for anyone involved with money. However, it is a noun, not a verb.

[deleted]

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#207

Post by bestnameever »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #200
NoInputSignal wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disclosure: I work for financial institution in the US. I think that the nature of wire transfers makes them somewhat risky. The institutions facilitating the transfers assume some of that risk for their consumers. If a large some of money is moved from your account to someone else's, and you dispute the transfer, the institution sending the wire may have to refund you the money. The cost of a single transfer offsets…

I don't see how cheques (or credit cards) are any different in this regard. Cheques can be forged, just as easy, if not easier than a wire transfer.

Checks are a little different. Many banks will not allow immediate availability of funds with checks which allows banks some time to catch fraud. Many businesses also communicate their check registers to banks which prevent forged checks from clearing the bank account.

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#208

Post by M2Ys4U »

Animats wrote: post #176
baddox wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ACH is not a common jargon term It’s not jargon at all, is it? It’s just literally the proper name for the specific payment network. I thought jargon is industry-specific slang terms for concepts that could otherwise be described with less industry-specific terms. There is no simpler or clearer way I’m aware of to refer specifically to ACH. As for it being common, if you work as a developer on any web products that…

> ACH is not a common jargon term It is for anyone involved with money. However, it is a noun, not a verb.

Maybe if you live in the US.

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#209

Post by glogla »

dmurray wrote: post #156
Tuna-Fish wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don't really get is why American payment systems insist on including some way to pull money out of an account, which therefore requires massive amounts of trust. The way the European system works is that there is one possible operation; the owner of an account can move money from their account to any other account. If you want me to pay you rent, you provide me with a standard format bill, which includes your…

> The way the European system works is that there is one possible operation; the owner of an account can move money from their account to any other account. This isn't true at all. The direct debit system allows any participant to withdraw money from your account, providing just your account number and a claim that you authorised them to do that. You never have to directly tell the bank anything, and in many cases yo…

Not sure where you're from, but here direct debit requires setting up "direct debit agreement" by the owner of the account, that specifies account number the debit comes from, how often and maximum amount.

So you setup something like "account 123 can debit up to 100 EUR monthly" and the bank enforces that.

Re: What Happens When You ACH a Dead Person?

#210

Post by eythian »

iokanuon wrote: post #70
kolinko wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s what wire transfers are for in EU. Same day/instant, either free or with a flat fee of $0.25-0.5. In Poland if you’re going out with friends and someone paid for you bc you forgot a card, you just wire them money from your phone. For my whole adult life (36 yo) I only used and saw an actual check once. Wire transfers since I can remember.

Since a few years ago, you were also able to use the BLIK system to transfer money instantly for free between most banks, by only knowing the recipient's phone number. To be fair I can't imagine anything more convenient.

In NL we have "Tikkie", where you just have to give them a link, whether it's by whatsapp, email, IRC, whatever. Sounds slightly more convenient as it's not based around a phone number (but can be if that's what you have :)
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