No slashes, double Xs or double 0s

Only Baby Boomers might have a clue what today’s column title is about. Where exactly are you prohibited from using slashes, XX, or 00? The practice goes back to a time when people generally wrote checks as payment.

For the longest time, Filipinos have used checks to cover or pay for transactions. Back then people usually wrote the amount covered by the check in words and in letters.

I don’t know how the practice evolved or if it was part of the original requirement, but people would often write 00/xx at the end of the numerical value to ensure that whoever deposited the check could not forge the written amount or add a few more zeroes!

Recently, the Banko Sentral ng Pilipinas and banks in the Philippines enforced a policy that prohibited so many things regarding issuing and receiving checks. The check had to be issued in the full name of the depositor, no folding, etc.

For decades, people could actually deposit a check issued in the nickname or common name of a person. While most Filipinos use their official names in official documents, a majority are generally known by their nickname or common name.

The rules are so strict in some banks that you have to make sure the check has your middle initial as well as Sr., Jr. or III/the third, etc. if necessary. After too brief a period of public information, people migrated to the new ways because they had no choice.

But it seems that the BSP and Bankers Association of the Philippines (BAP) need to do more in terms of informing or educating the public, especially those of us who are 50 to 60 years old and above.

This week, I learned of two unfortunate incidents where what was meant for good ended up becoming annoying and stressful for people. The first case involved a generous donation made in the form of a check to a public hospital.

The second involved 50 or more checks given as gifts to a young couple who may have to migrate abroad or needed funds more than appliances to get started in life.

The first case quickly got complicated after the check was turned over because the amount was immediately assigned to two projects and all the needed equipment was ordered. But within a week of deposit, the bank returned the check.

The bank had encircled the portion where the donor wrote xx/00 as he has probably done on thousands of checks he issued in his lifetime. The hospital administrator was surely embarrassed to return the check, more so the person who has to go back to the generous donor to get a replacement check!

That, of course, is nothing compared to the newly married couple and their parents, who now have to call each and every Ninong, Ninang and all the generous guests they invited to their wedding. In the words of one, “These banks turned me into a scammer by simply refusing to honor my check!”

No one talks about it or has written about this complication that came out of the BSP and banks wanting “Machine Readable Checks.” As ideal as their goal is, it refuses to acknowledge that it takes months if not years to unlearn long accepted practice.

A few weeks or a month of so-called public information has clearly not led to the full adoption of change. I always remind government executives that having a website and Facebook account does not automatically make you seen, heard or read.

In this age of selective and need driven engagement, people “Google search” or scroll Meta for their needs and interests. If government such as the BSP cares about the public, then they should make banks more engaged with their clients and depositors, especially the Baby Boomers.

We have all had some problem regarding checks in the age of AI and machine-readable technology, and real people still need to address the problems of real people.

If the banks can actually review the check, encircle or point out what is defective or unacceptable, take the time and effort to return the check to their depositor, how difficult is it to make a phone call, write an email just to confirm if the check is OK?

The point is, Humans are denying Humans the service they expect from institutions they trust with their wealth in order to conform with the requirements of machine-readable technology, AI or some other system that was supposed to make life easier or faster.

My wife Karen suggested that banks simply charge a small fee to correct or accommodate the oversight. Inform the depositor but fix the problem and just charge a fee like they do for every ATM transaction.

I know of incidents where long-time depositors complained to top executives and almost immediately bank managers called clients and were asked to come back to the bank to remedy the situation. It should not come to that.

In the wedding I mentioned, at least two dozen guests who gave gift checks were CEOs, business owners whose companies transact multimillion-peso deals weekly. Their reputation speaks for them and to have your check returned to you would surely annoy them.

In the age of competitive banking, it would surely hurt if a big client changed banks. Imagine them saying, “My money is good enough for you to take but not my checks that have slashes, double XXs or double 00s?”

Wake up, BSP & BAP!