The Cheque Signs off in UK

The Payments Council in the UK has decided to phase out the good old cheque by October 2018.

In the end, we resisted the temptation to pun (though passing up cheque mate was tough). Because it is sad news even if it doesn’t concern us directly. The Payments Council in the UK has decided to phase out the good old cheque by October 2018. Instead, there will be plastic, meaning credit and debit cards, electronic payments and hard cash. The logic seems a bit fuzzy: they say cheque use has been declining, yet 54 per cent of adults in the UK still use cheques, by the Payment Council’s own estimates. The council needs to figure out how they can get users to adapt to other means of payment. Which is probably why they’ve given themselves nine years to phase it out.