Who should sign company cheques?

[abm37]

In your company who signs the cheques written out? What is the safest method?

 

[KidsBeeHappy]

Why are you using cheques?

 

[abm37]

For purchasing, etc.

 

[KidsBeeHappy]

But cheques will be costing you one heck of a lot more in charges etc than processing payments online via direct online banking etc. Will also be costing your suppliers significantly more to bank them. Most banks standard business tariffs offer the electronic payments free, or at least significantly cheaper (and I know that LOADS of people are now going to post threads about free business accounts )

You don't have to go down the bacs route, as old, producing BACs files etc, you can pay someone in a matter of seconds, and the money will be in their bank before you've even logged out.

Not one of my suppliers has ever stated that they prefer cheque payments.

 

[abm37]

That's true, but in my country I see most people still use cheques to pay bills, etc. If you had to write cheques, who should be the one signing it?

 

[KidsBeeHappy]

Sorry, didnt realise that you were overseas.

Normally, it is sensible to authorise the finance manager etc to sign up to a certain limit, and then amounts over that require finance manager and 1 director/business owner. And amount over a certain sensitive level (ie that which would require board authorisation) should require 2 directors signatures.

if you don't have a good/responsible finance manager, then I would start with all normal cheques being signed by finance manager and counter signed by 1 director.

Then you need to confirm all of this with your bank in the mandate, this way your wishes should be enforced partically by the bank even if there are slip ups in the office.

Hope this helps.

 

[SalesDNA]

Years ago I learnt a lesson from Donald Trump (not personally!) - He signs every cheque (or did at the time) so he never loses sight of what is going on his own business.

 

[Mattonella Tile Studio]

I wish our suppliers were as forward thinking as yours Boxby. They're getting better, but a lot are still cheque on delivery, or cheque at end of month.

 

[KidsBeeHappy]

I wish our suppliers were as forward thinking as yours Boxby. They're getting better, but a lot are still cheque on delivery, or cheque at end of month.

Tell them that you're changing over to making all payments via direct payment into bank, and that as your bank uses "faster payments" it means that they'll have cleared funds into their account the same day that you the process the payment.

See how many of them have the nerve to knock that back

 

[UKSEOAgency]

90% of our suppliers are paid by electronic methods (BACS / Paypal)

the other 10% insist upon cheques

 

[Watermill Accounting]

Normally Directors of the company sign cheques. However an officer could be authorised to sign cheques. But as said by Boxy it will cost effective and convenient to pay online, not just for you but also for your vendor. They will save the pain of depositing cheques in bank and wait for clearance.