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Show i f The Bad Check ! i 1 ! By Frederic J. Haskin. 4 WASJIIXGTOX, Dec. I. To make the check as reliable a bit of paper as a United States gold certificate is the object ob-ject of a campaign now being carried on by Washington merchants and bankers, and, to some extent, by those of many oilier cities. The bad check is a pest everywhere, but there are ft w large cities where it flourishes as ii docs in Washington or, rather, as it has in the past. For the local business men are now out after the check artists in earnest. Tli is reaction follows a golden era for crcdi.-;. Shopkeepers have at times been gullible and obsequious. They have trusted , to their ability to read character at first glance. But only too often The clui racter- reading system has g-one wrong, and the guileless-looking customer has turned out to be a bad check performer per-former with a long record of successes. The wave of crime which followed tho war brought a considerable increase in bail check operations. Professional crooks, say the police, steer comparatively comparative-ly el en r of straight forgery and check raising, as the penalties arc severe and there is a small ehwnce of pleading- caro-lessntss. caro-lessntss. Ptn passing checks when there is no account, or when the account is overdrawn, is a popular pastime both with professional and amateur check artists, nnd the alibi of ignorance of the exact amount in bank is worked steadily, ('nice In a while, of course, an honest per-so per-so n d o c s p ro f f e r a check in good faith when his balance is too low to back it, but t)i is ex -use has been so often used by crooks that it is difficult to make it convincing. Tim- was when a haughty expression or a burst of oratory along the line of, "1 am Mrs. 1 1 ope well St. Charles. My word of honor lias never been doubted in this town before," was guaranteed to reduce re-duce a banker, merchant or hotel manager man-ager to a state of fluttering apology. Now, one hotel manager says, "When we ask a patron for references, either he gives them willingly, and we check them up and serve him, or he gets blustery and rages, in which case we stay calm and keep our money in the safe." Due to this level-headed philosophy, hotel keepers suffer far less from bad check passers than do merchants. Most large hotels keep their own credit records, rec-ords, very much like those of the merchant's mer-chant's credit-rating bureaus. If an unidentified un-identified patron asks that a check be cashed, the manager presents a form to be filled out to show the applicant's name, address and financial references. This record is verified a nd kept in the hotel for f uture use. Hotel records are supplemented by informal ion contained in hotel journals warning managers against persons who are trying to beat their way and pass bogus checks on hotel clerks. Once in a while, however, hotels get taken in, temporarily, at least. A short time ago a young woman blew into Washington .from a farm in a near-by state. Her longing for good clothes and luxuries had never been gratified, and Washington looked easy. She obtained some blank checks, established herself in a big hotel and proceeded to hand out worthless checks lo clothiers, milliners, florists and at the hotel. It was not long before she was apprehended, but meantime she had tricked a number of supposedly fool-proof business men with her line of talk and some clever acting, ii: Kven more than the hotels, banks insist in-sist on satisfactory credentials before honoring checks. "N'ot so long ago." says a "Washington bank cashier, "a forger could walk into a bank with a check prepared a nd the clerk would merely ask him. 'How'll you have it?' " Now many banks make it a rule to cash checks only for their depositors, and positive pos-itive identification is demanded. The way of a forger under such circumstances is decidedly hard. Activities of check artists vary in the different states, according to the stringency strin-gency of state laws and the vigilance of state prosecution. In some states the passer of an overdrawn check is given twenty-four hours in which to make it good ; in other states a longer time is set. In practically every state the penally pen-ally for forgery is heavy. In the District Dis-trict of Columbia check artists and bad check reformers are both very active. There is no definite law penalizing presentation pres-entation of bad checks in the District. The matter is largely covered by general gen-eral laws on larceny and misdemeanors; but the general opinion is that a specific law would better conditions. :;: Washington has for some years been 07ie of the favorite haunts of check art ists. High t now about eighty men and women . are under indictment for passing' bogus government checks in Washington. Yet the number of war workers engaged in this, business lias not been excessive, according to the Washington Wash-ington detective bureau. That is. the increase in-crease in bad check cases during the war has been in fair proportion to Washington's Wash-ington's increase in population. The uniform is used as a cloak for all sorts of check schemes. Two professionals, profes-sionals, for instance, toured the country for somd time dressed as United States soldiers. One would offer a check in payment for a purchase. While the shopkeeper shop-keeper looked it over, thp other soldier would step up. stating that he was a recruiting officer, and offer to indorse the check and vouch for the boy's character. char-acter. These crooks, among many others, -were pursued through the bulletin of the Merchants' Mer-chants' Credit association and through retail credit bureaus. The retail dealers' credit rating bureau is. as one business man puts it. the Bradstreet of the rew tai) merchant. It is a local affair, a central cen-tral storehouse of credit information for the city, whore the merchant can obtain ob-tain facts as to the standing of John Doe and his wife if they have had any experience with checks or other forms of credit. The problem of the merchant is to ascertain the value of a check while the customer waitu. The function of the central credit bureau is to furnish the customer's rat ing instantly. These central cen-tral bureaus are being established in various cities. They claim never to express ex-press an opinion on any individual's character or finances, and to keep their records strictly confidential. Bad check operators, persons who are not good pay. persons who skin without paying their bills, are reported each night to the central credit station and the merchants mer-chants of the city are warned hi the next day's bulletin. These daily bulletins of local 'bureaus are simply mimeographed memoranda, reporting local credit news of the day before. They are sent out to all the merchants, bankers, doctors, lawyers and other business and professional profes-sional men who belong to the credit association. as-sociation. The work of the credit bureaus bu-reaus is said in many towns to be extremely ex-tremely effective. The final and logical outcome of the bad check deals is that the public pays. Not that Uic merchant who finds that lie lias been cheated out of ten dollars immediately adds ten dollars to the price or' a coat in his window. But the merchant mer-chant deposits the worthless check. It comes back, and the merchant has to subtract the sum from his balance in th-,- bank. It becomes pirt of his overhead over-head expense, and is included in his estimate esti-mate when h" f-'xes prices to make his percentage of profit. ' Thus it behooves ail of us interested in lowering the high cost of living to cooperate with those who are agitating bad check reform. Merchants and bankers bank-ers are not so eager to apprehend check artists still at large as to discourage-further discourage-further passing of bad checks. Enforcement of state laws, establishment establish-ment of credit rating bureaus and help from the public are all said by merchants mer-chants to be essential if the check is to become the sacred institution that business busi-ness men would have it. The public is asked by the merchants to be careful in making out check's not to leave room for figures to be raised. It is asked not to lave checks lying around, not ! o get e:.ciied u (.iiiizxed as to its bit'-ntity and finances when credit is asked, and. most important of ail, o f:ir -A as bad checks are concerned, it is ear- neslly requested to keep tab on its bank j I balance. J |
