Hartford Courant, February 13, 2007 - By Josh Funk,   Associated Press

"Is Paying By Check Becoming Passe?"  

"Debit Cards Drive Change: Merchants Helping Electronic Payments Gain Favor"

Omaha, Neb.-" Richard Kesterson slid his debit card out of his wallet even before the cashier at a Hy-Vee Grocery Store in   west Omaha rang up his total.   Kesterson, like millions of other Americans, did not even consider paying by check.   Using a debit card is easier, he said.   He also eschews checks when   paying his bills in favor of online bill paying, then lets his bank keep track of his spending.   " I haven't balanced my account in 10 years." Kesterson said.    

Such habits are part of the reason that check   writting has declined sharply since 1995.   The Federal Reserve estimates that 49.5 billion checks were paid in the United States in 1995:   that figure dropped to 36.6 billion checks paid in 2003, according to the most recent Fed studies.   Increasingly, some checks are even being converted to electronic payments by merchants, who prefer electronic transfers to handling paper checks.  

The widespread availability of debit cards and the growing popularity of plastic are the biggest factors in the decline.   Between 2000 and 2003, the number of debit card transactions nearly doubled, from 8.3 billion to 15.6 billion, and the number of credit card transactions jumped from 15.6 billion to 19 billion.    

Together, credit and debit card use accounted for 43 percent of all non-cash payments in 2003, up from 33 percent in 2000.   In some cases, consumers may write a check, but merchants increasingly are scanning those checks and converting them into an electronic payment.   Converting checks to electronic payments allows merchants to get paid quicker, and it may help reduce the number of insufficient-funds checks that businesses have to deal with.     Processing checks electronically is also cheaper than processing paper checks."  

Transaction World Magazine, February 2007, Volume 7 Issue 2.

Industry News Section

"More than 67 million Americans have used a credit or debit card for a purchase of less than $5.00 in the past 30 days according to the fourth annual comprehensive, quantitative survey on the small payments market released today at the 2006 Micro and Small Payments Conference in New York City.   This shows that consumers are willing and ready to use credit and debit cards for small payments."