Save $100 in 10 Minutes: Watch Your Chequing Account
While a lot of bills are handled online and via credit cards, there are many of us that still rely on cheques on a semi-regular basis. We’re certainly getting away from cheques as a standard form of payment, and as such, we pay less attention to our chequing accounts.
For me, I write 12 cheques/year for rent on my apartment, other than that, my finances are all taken care of online, automatically. The manual factor of cheques can leave you open to a few dangers:
- forgetting to do it (seriously… this can happen and your landlord won’t like it)
- bouncing a cheque (we’ll talk about the excessive fees soon)
- losing the physical cheque
Any of those three are bad enough, but bouncing the cheque can be disastrous to your credit, your bank account and to the relationship with the cheque recipient.
By issuing a cheque from an account with insufficient funds to support it, you are opening yourself up to $200 in fees! That will cover the banking fees, service fees and others associated with the bounced cheque. Another penalty that some people forget about: the negative impact on your credit score. Not to mention the fact that if you bounce a rent cheque, you could get bounced from your apartment.
To avoid this, we recommend checking in on your chequing account on a regular basis. Keep track of how much cash you have at your disposal to avoid those unnecessary fees. This is going to take you a few minutes/week, and could save you hundreds (and even your place to live). Trust us, it’s worth it.
If you’re getting close to the 1st of the month and you’re risking a bounced cheque, turn to Mogo. Our products are cheaper than bouncing, and won’t affect your credit score.