[mulmen]

They can be pretty handy. I don't have a physical checkbook and that causes problems for me once or twice a year. Typically when I am buying motorcycles. Those transactions tend to take place on weekends when my bank is closed and for amounts larger than my ATM cash withdrawal limit. They also tend to occur with parties that do not accept electronic payment methods.

[stephen_g]

I think the "parties not accepting electronic methods" bit is more surprising to people in places with more modern banking systems...

In Australia you can hardly buy anything anymore with ordinary cheques (you can still use a bank cheque for a car from a dealer or deposit on a house something, but that's the kind that you go to the bank, pay a fee and they print it out).

Hardly any private seller for a car or anything would ever take a cheque though - it's mostly always electronic. This year they're bringing in a real-time system (the current one is free overnight transfer to other banks and immediate for the same bank) which you can send people money immediately with just a mobile number.

[mulmen]

The last motorcycle I bought I had to wait two days to go to a physical branch and get a (free!) cashiers check then go back to the shop to buy the bike. We made the deal on a Saturday and the guy asked for a check and I said "It's 2018, I don't have a checkbook" to which he chuckled but it wasn't clear what I would have used instead. Normally I would just carry cash but I don't make habit of holding on to that much cash. There are billpay methods I could use with my bank but they are not instant, anything instant would have cost something like 3% which on ~$5,000.00 is not feasible.

This is how it has always been (tm) here. It's interesting to hear about the glorious future that other countries have. How do you identify the account you are transferring to? I was technically interacting with a business, do they just give me a phone number/email and I use that?

I think my bank is working on a way to do instant transfers but I'm not sure how any of that works.

[stephen_g]

With BPay, you have a biller code (six character number) and a reference (which is longer, like 12 characters - usually this is like your customer number with that biller, so it doesn’t change). Generally every bill you get will have those details on them. It’s free which is nice.

For a regular transfer, you have a six digit number that identifies the bank/branch, and an account number (variable length, depends on branch). You just always use this method and your bank checks whether it’s a BSB at the same bank and does an instant transfer, and if not clears it through the central bank. I think batches run at 9am and 5pm every business day for that.

For those kind of payments, they’re bringing in two new things this year - a new real-time clearing system for small interbank transfers (that is, under like $100k or $250k or something - larger payments you have to use a special system called RTGS), and ‘PayID’ where you can have a mobile number for an individual or your Australian Business Number for a company, and I think internally it resolves back to the account number / BSB (I guess like a DNS system for banks).

[mulmen]

Sounds like the case of a $5,000.00 motorcycle deal on Saturday afternoon still isn't handled "instantly" in the same way a check would be. At least not until the real-time system arrives.