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How many times have you handed a check to a home repair contractor as a deposit for materials? How about the check you wrote to the stranger who offered to sell you firewood "off his truck" for an unbelievably low price? The door-to-door magazine salesman?

Every time a check is tendered for payment, the recipient knows a lot about you. Maybe more than you think. This is especially true if the recipient asks you for additional information, such as your driver's license number, social security number, or home telephone number (which may or may not be an unlisted number).

So what, you might ask. I have nothing to hide! While this may be true, there are certain aspects of your dealings that you may not particularly want to make public. A check can find it's way to five or more locations before being cleared, including being endorsed over to another merchant. You are counting on the honesty and integrity of each of those persons in the chain. By putting your home telephone number on a check, you may find yourself added to the store telemarketing list. If you don't like getting those calls at dinnertime, use your work telephone number (after checking with your employer, of course). In this way, the merchant can still contact you if there is a problem processing your check, but your privacy will remain intact. Also, your home telephone number, when written on a paycheck, bank draft, or cashier's check, allows the recipient (or anyone else who comes in contact with the check) to perform a reverse telephone number lookup. Anyone can find your home address by using the Internet if they have your telephone number—including a map of how to get there!

The merchant also likes to have your driver's license and/or social security numbers to find and prosecute you in case of non-payment because of non-sufficient funds or forgery. Many states include the social security number on the face of their driver's license. By allowing someone to copy the face of your driver's license, you are also giving them access to enough information to determine your full name (including middle name), legal address, date of birth, and social security number—everything they need to run a credit report on you—before they steal your identity! If you know and trust your merchant, get their assurance that your check will be deposited directly into their bank account, and not just signed over to a third-party to pay one of their suppliers. Ideally, your trusted merchant will maintain a check-cashing log, separate from the check, on which they retain any information that they feel is necessary to safeguard their interests. When you have the slightest doubt, use a debit (or better still, a credit) card.

What about the dishonest merchant who doesn't care about your personal information, but just wants your physical check so that it can be altered? Most ink used to write checks can be removed using common household chemicals. This leaves the pre-printed information intact, while eradicating the payee name, the amounts, and the date. To make alteration more difficult by leaving an impression in the paper, you should use a high quality ballpoint pen rather than a felt-tipped or fountain pen. Of course, the maximum deterrent to alteration is found in our Paymaster® Check Protection Systems product line.

Care should be taken when selecting your check stock. Many bargain check brokers can be found in the Sunday supplement of your local newspapers, on the Internet, and in coupons mailed to your home or business. While most of these businesses are reputable, the product that they sell may not always accepted by your financial institution.

Under the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) criteria for check printing, the same specifications required of any financial institution are used in the printing of Paymaster® Checks. Some of these specifications include:


Of course, Paymaster® Technologies respects your right to privacy. All bank and credit card information given to us for a check order is destroyed using one of our Paymaster® Shredders after your order has been shipped. While this might make your re-order a bit less streamlined, since we will have to ask you again for your bank router and account information, we practice what we preach—the fewer companies that retain personal information about you, the better off you are.

Robert P. Koper
President, Paymaster Technologies, Inc.