Bankers draft?
 

Got a chap buying the wifes DC5 ITR & he wants to pay with the above. Is there any way to check that it's authentic (heard horror stories of stolen ones that are worthless) prior to the day that I see it? Chap wants to pick car up early this Saturday morning ie before Banks are open.

Can they be cancelled like a normal cheque ie once I have it could he cancel it?

Just being paranoid :eek:

TX.

I don't realease any car until receipt of cleared funds.

Just phone the bank it's drawn on, most have 24/7 call centres.

They will have a register of everyone issued but you will probably need to speak the the branch it is drawn on to get the details verified. If they say it's genuine they should have the funds already and it will not bounce, you could ask them to be double sure.

Oh, and look up the banks phone number yourself - don't take mateys word for it if he happens to know it. Could be his pal at the other end.

*CAUTION* Bank drafts can be stopped just like a cheque! Pretty useless really

Stopped:eek::eek::eek: That makes them useless - and in addition to having to call the drawing bank to check. D

Yep they are not really worth anything more than a standard cheque.

Might also be fake, could be obtained via fraud, could be a bank account set up on a fake ID etc etc.

CASH CASH AND CASH.

Thats all I will ever take for car sales these days. And check that with a "fake pen".

HTH.

Meet the guy in his bank, get him to have called through in advance so that they will have the cash ready. Then once you're in receipt of the cash, give him the keys and walk to your bank (assuming you don't use the same bank) so you can pay it in. That way no probs with counterfeit cash, miscounting, or having large amounts of cash on you... I've found that's the safest way to deal now.

Agreed :thumb:

Only issue is if he mugs you one the way to your bank, although that is not so likely (I hope) :)

if it has been drawn on the bank then the only reason it will be stopped is because its stolen.

Check with the issuing bank, get the draft number and then away you go.

Just like i did ;)

Feck :eek:

TX.

No they cannot ...

They are drawn on cleared funds and the funds are removed from the payers account ...

They are as good as cash - just ring the Bank and give them the number of the draft - ask them who it is made out to, and the amount.

If this comes back correct then it is as good as cash ...

I agree with Luminous, but would rather risk being mugged on the way to the bank with the cash (bring a friend if you're worried), than being bent over on a dodgy cheque. Also, who here hand on heart would know if you're being given cash if it's counterfeit or not. Sure some will be clear fakes and ropey, but nowadays with the technology !? I wouldn't know, and someone mentioned bring the pen ? How could I tell with that ? I sold a high value car that someone paid cash for. He turned up with the cash, I drove the pair of us to the bank, and only then did I hand over the keys once the bank had taken "ownership and counted it"

There are too many pikeys out there for my liking. As Mulder and Scully would say "TRUST NOONE!"

:)

Hello stranger :)

Draft is from Barclays. Went there yesterday & they can't / won't confirm either way! Need to see it apparently rather than just go on ref nr. So I can go to Barclays on Sat morning with the purchaser & his draft, get them to check it & away we go albeit I now know it can be stopped :(

I've asked the purchaser to bring some recent bills on the day to check where he lives which is another precaution. If the draft did get stopped then he's nicked the car & I could involve the Police although tis painful ...

Mmmm.

TX.

if he's willing to go to his bank to get the banker's draft, why not get him to get the cash instead ?!? Same grief for him. You can meet him at his bank or meet him direct at yours (better for you). He wont have cash on him if you meet him at his bank, so no risk to him?!!?

^^ He's already got it & will bring it on the day (he's not local to me). Could tell him to cancel it & bring cash (draw cash out from his bank & deposit in mine as suggested above) albeit now confused as to whether the draft can be cancelled or not ...

TX.

can he not just do an online bank transfer? much faster and convenient :thumb:

unless there is some kind of scare with these also

The buyer probably wont want to do an online bank transfer as he has no control.. you will have to wait for cleared funds, and what happens to the car in the meantime. Even with a chaps payment, there's no guarantee what time the cash is going to arrive.

STC - We don't bank at same place unfortunately (Barclays vs HSBC) so a transfer will take a few days from pushing the button. If both at same bank it would be instant. Plus he's already got the draft in his hands ie he's paid Barclays the purchase price & Barclays have written me a cheque using their account.

TX.

so can't he send you the cheque,you bank it and he collects when it clears?

Bollocks, I have had a bankers draft cancelled on me before all you have to do is report it stolen and the bank wil cancel it. There are people out there who know that they can pay with a genuine draft get the car and then report the draft stolen and get it cancled. At this point you cannot report the car stolen as you let them drive it away.

I am pretty sure that both of your banks are on the fast pay system so no need to wait for the transfer.

I paid ny brother a few hundred quid last week, (Barclays -> HSBC) it was certainly in his account a couple of hours later, may have been sooner I don't think he had checked before then. Not sure how well Fast Pay works outside of normal banking hours though.

A banker's draft (also called a bank cheque or, in the US, a cashier's check) is a cheque (or check) where the funds are taken directly from the financial institution rather than the individual drawer's account.

A normal cheque represents an instruction to transfer a sum of money from the drawer's account to the payee's account. When the payee deposits the cheque into their account, the cheque is verified as genuine (or 'cleared', a process typically taking several days) and the transfer is performed (usually via a clearing house or similar system). Any individual or company operating a current account (or checking account) has authority to draw cheques against the funds stored in that account.

However, it is impossible to predict when the cheque will be deposited after it is drawn. Because the funds represented by a cheque are not transferred until the cheque is deposited and cleared, it is possible the drawer's account may not have sufficient funds to honour the cheque when the transfer finally occurs. This dishonoured or 'bounced' cheque is now worthless and the payee receives no money, which is why cheques are less secure than cash.

By contrast, when an individual requests a banker's draft they must immediately transfer the amount of the draft (plus any applicable fees and charges) from their own account to the bank's account. (An individual without an account at the issuing bank may request a banker's draft and pay for it in cash, subject to applicable anti-money laundering law and the bank's issuing policies.) Because the funds of a banker's draft have already been transferred they are proven to be available; unless the draft is a forgery or stolen, or the bank issuing the draft goes out of business before the draft is deposited and cleared, the draft will be honoured. Like other types of cheques, a draft must still be cleared and so it will take several days for the funds to become available in the payee's account.

In the United Kingdom the use of bankers' drafts is being phased out. With the advent of new techology such as debit cards, internet banking and Faster Payments the method of a guaranteed paper cheque is now regarded as slower and less secure for both the issung bank and the customer

I took cash for my Evo (sob) - we are all confused on bankers draughts after all!
We paid it straight into the Nationwide and then he got the keys and log book. I couldnt think of a better way...although it seems a bit primitive!!!

D

@Diesel -Agreed... exactly what I recommend.. Only way to be sure !

The police would have something to say about that as what you have described is fraud and obtaining money by deception.

I used to work in a bank and have made out hundreds of these things.

The funds must be in the banks possesion and while they can be reported stolen if its been paid into an account in the name of the payee, that the bank will already have a record of and cannot be changed, the police would be called straight away. Fakes are the biggest risk but if you call the bank it is drawn on you should be ine.

I accepted a draft for a car I was selling once. Never, ever again. Fortunately, the buyer was an honest chap, but there were so many ways it could have gone wrong. The "security" of a draft is a complete illusion IMHO.

Firstly, having never even seen a bank draft before, I had no idea what a real one should look like. The seller e-mailed me a scan of the front and back well before collection - turns out they look just like a normal cheque, but are machine-printed rather than hand-written.
I called the helpline to check if it was real, to be told the helpline no longer operated. After some faffing in telephone queues I got through to someone that could "help".
However, due to the data protection act all they could tell me was that A draft had been drawn from branch X of the bank on X date for X amount. They couldn`t tell me who drew it or who it was payable to, neither could they tell me any other references on it or any other way to check if it was real.

Collection day came and I met the chap at the airport as agreed, handed over the car and received a small bit of paper in return. More than a little nervous, I went to the bank the next morning to pay it in, where I was told that it would take up to ten days to clear, and should the draft be reported stolen or otherwise arouse suspicion, could be stopped at any time.

Aside from its supposed inability to bounce, it was no more secure than accepting a personal cheque.

They guy who did it to me never got the car as I refused to let him have it untill the funds cleared so he lost his deposit but I got the impression he has tried the same trick more than once,

So did you report it to the police to stop it happening again?