Vendors holding onto checks friggin' forever.

I know that my wedding musicians would usually hold the deposit check until the week of the wedding. I insisted that they cash it right away. If it were me I'd be taking it to the bank within a few days.

Businesses do this for a variety of reasons. With online banking, it can get confusing if your vendor is holding a check because you always have to scroll down to see if the check has hit your bank yet. With paper registries, it's just accepted as gone -- whether they cash it immediately or hold it for two months.

If you're having a problem with it, and I do understand your position, withdraw cash, type up a receipt with all of the details, and both of you sign it when the cash is exchanged.

I am mailing them the checks, and I really do not have time to drive to them and make a payment in cash. I would much prefer to use my debit card, but some prefer checks and some only accept checks or cash-in person. My vendors are all located about 45 minutes away from my area. It's just frustrating to wait so long. I finally emailed my MUAH person and asked if there was a problem with the check I had mailed her since it still had not been cashed. She cashed it the next day.

Checks are only good for 90 days...they better not wait too long

Actually, the US Commercial Code says that personal checks are good for 180 days, usually six months. After that, they become "stale", and a bank may not pay them.

I really hate when vendors do this. I've spent the extra $5 a few times and got money orders just to avoid the stress of waiting for checks to clear my account. I also push PayPal as much as I can. That way we both have documentation and it can clear my account quickly.

@ Charla...my baker and my florist both let you use PayPal with I loved!

Regarding the whole..."how long is a check good for"....last year I had a charity deposit a check that I had written over a year before and my bank (credit union) accepted it. I called the charity up and told them that if they waited an entire year to cash my check they clearly did not need any further funding from me. The founder of the charity called me the next day and personally apologized. It was ridiculous. My credit union also said it is up to the bank whether or not the think the check is still "viable" after such a long time.

Oops...my fault! It definitely is 180 days. Brain fart on my part...I should have known that lol I used to work in a bank. In my defense, it was only a 3 month seasonal position and that was about 7 years ago. Thank you for providing the correct information

I completely understand why you would be annoyed! I would have never thought of this, especially since the only vendor I have booked at this point is my wedding planner who takes credit cards on their website and Paypal.

@Charla The money order idea is cool and you could probably save more if you wanted to make the extra trip to like 7-Eleven or something (their money orders are only like $1.39 compared to my bank charging $5). In the South many places will let you get a money order for cheap and use your debit card to pay for it. Those $4 for every vendor payment times however many months could add up, IJS.

That never annoyed me. I am/was very careful with my money and once I wrote a check, I knew that money wasn't available to me anymore. So it didn't matter when they cashed it.

@ EricaTx...it's really not a matter of the funds being there or not. Since I am mailing the checks out to the vendors it is also a concern of whether or not they received the check-cashing it promptly lets me know it was received.

I use online bill pay. You should check with your bank to see if they offer this. I hate to mail checks because all of my information is on it. If the wrong person gets they hands on it they can order and pay things with your account. All they need is the routing number and account number and sometimes your address. All that information is on your check.

Great idea Julia!

My bank does offer online bill pay, I use that for my routine monthly bills.

I can definitely set up my different vendors to be paid that way.

Out florist did this and it pissed me off.. Do you not want you money?! I called her and asked if she received it or not and when she said yes I told her I won't make another payment until the first check was cashed. She deposited it the next day. I track my funds but I hate seeing money in my accounts when it isn't supposed to be in there.