Dear Editor,
A businessman [name supplied] who has a huge building in Regent Street owes me $35,000 on a business transaction. I was asked to check back with him on four different occasions over a five-week period for payment. Finally on Friday, February 25, with a flourish, the businessman brought out a fat cheque book and had his cashier make out a cheque for $35,000 for me. Now I am smiling all the way to the bank.
On Wednesday, March 9, at 8.15 am the bank called and asked me to uplift a returned cheque. I am all so confused. I stupidly asked the caller if it is a cheque that I issued forgetting that a dishonoured cheque will be returned to the person to whom I paid. No, Ma’am, it is the returned cheque of [name given].
I am now upset. But I am looking forward to hear the businessman’s excuse. Maybe I should take it to the police first, but just thinking of this time-consuming exercise and the taxi fares involved gives me cause to pause.
Now all you advisers/soothsayers out there constantly haranguing people for doing cash only transactions please advise and take note. Personally I have found that only people whom I know will accept a cheque. Others state upfront that company policy does not permit them to accept a cheque. Honour and integrity are devalued currencies in this country.
How many more dishonoured cheques must this businessman issue before the bank feels that it is time to take away the privilege of brandishing a cheque book? More importantly, will someone from the banking sector inform the public what infractions will lead to the discontinuation of a chequing account? How many ‘bounced’ cheques? When does a dishonoured cheque constitute fraud?
In this rip-off society the plight of rice farmers who are paid millions of dollars on a piece of paper is only one example that I will highlight, and the concomitant futile song and dance that ensued all the way to the President.
And their bankers continue to issue more fat cheque books!
‘In God We Trust’ is a worst case scenario. My gardener is still crying over the counterfeit $100 bill he purchased from someone in America Street.
Integrity is all you’ve got by Karl Eller should be made compulsory reading for all business students and budding entrepreneurs.
Yours faithfully,
Hema Persaud
