Checks???

I am sure everyone has seen the warnings about signing the date this year. No idea what I am talking about? There is a Facebook warning that says when you write the date on important documents and checks, you should write out 2020 instead of shortening it to just 20 (as in 1/4/20). 

The story goes on to say that people could change the date of the document to 2019 or even earlier. It is not awful advice. You should probably write out the date on all important documents. When we bought our house, I made sure to sign everything “In the year of our Lord, two thousand nineteen.” No confusion when you do it that way. 

However, why do people keep mentioning checks? First off, who the hell even uses a check anymore??? (I swear, the first person that comments about how they use checks, I will…do nothing, because whatever). Okay, but if you have to write a check, I hate to break it to you, but the date is irrelevant. If you write a future date on the check, banks do not have to honor that date. I learned that the hard way years ago. 

I just cannot think of a reason why it would matter if someone changed the date on a check. I suppose and this is a really far out there situation. If you have a landlord who wants to collect late fees from you, they could change the dates and say that you were super late on paying rent. However, if you took it to court, it would be pretty easy to prove it wrong. The date of when it was cashed, plus you could probably show the order of the checks and have the bank pull up all of the old checks to show a chronology. Again, I cannot imagine a scenario where this comes back to haunt you because of a check. 

I do not think it is bad advice to write out the date fully, especially if you are signing some kind of document that could be legally binding or time sensitive (however, that is probably good advice any time you sign stuff).