User Centered

Wow, that's a great idea. Brilliant even. Like direct deposit without giving your company details.

While scanner would be best, I see no reason you couldn't use your sufficiently megapixeled out camera phone.

Congrats on the job, especially on it being a field of interest to yourself. That's awesome! Being a bank I hope they are paying you sufficiently well enough to justify your loss of time here.

Yum

Thanks. The time loss is attributed to the normal "moving" activities- finding a new place to live, closing up projects at my current job etc... Hopefully I'll be back on track after things get settled a bit.

That's a good point. Maybe I'll try a camera and see if it'll take.

What about security ?
How do they prevent that people send their scanned checks over and over again ?
If I snail-mail the check, it is gone. If I scan it, I could send it again from time to time.

tCfkaDA-
Well, I presume if I try to deposit it again, and USAA goes to take money from the issuing bank account....that the issuing bank would say "whooooooaaa there buddy! -you've already cashed this check." -unless USAA catches it first. I'm sure they have some software that actually *reads* the routing & check numbers on the check.

...and if I change the check number e.g. with Photoshop ? I'm curious how they will prevent misuse of this otherwise very interesting feature.

tCfkaDA- Well, nothing is preventing you photoshopping a fake number into it I suppose... but the funds have to come from *somewhere* When USAA asks the other issuing bank for the funds on a fake check number, a flag of somesort would be raised- or at the very least the account being charged could raise a compaint that funds are being withdrawn against it without a real check being issued.

You could ask the same question in regards to paper checks- how do they currently prevent people from depositing fake/made up accounts?

I'm sure there's a large infrastructure and "prior work" done in the area of check scamming.

...in the end, just like with check scams, the person depositing into the account is responsible for the check being deposited. If it's bogus, the bank will bounce it and you will be responsible any cash taken out against it (since it will often "clear" in 1-5 days by federal law, but 2-3 weeks later be rejected as counterfeit)

I have a scanner on my desk. Canon CanoScan N1240U, which is nice and thin for portability and is powered via USB. It was sitting around unused for awhile, but I recently brought it into work.

Is there anything wrong with using a high-res digital camera instead?

Jon writes:

I don't understand this archaic scanner talk. I still work at a place that relies heavily on fax for documents, and so do many of our consultants. We haven't even moved into the realm of scanning yet, and now we have been left behind the technological wave, so to speak?

I also use my scanners at home all the time for graphic work (I'm an architect, always getting plans and such on paper). One is a dinosaur Mustek that goes up to about 4800dpi and the other an HP that showed up as a free promo one day. I would guess that anyone that does photography, layout, publishing, design, legal work, or anything that requires moving paper would "still" have one.

If anyone has a scanner that they would like to donate, I am also looking to build a box camera scanner out of old parts.

Sorry casted my post that way Jon. I was thinking about the users that are bank members (in this case USAA.. Which usually are or are related to military members/veterans) and who deposit checks as being those folks that would likely not have a scanner.

I never see them in offices or homes these days... But I don't doubt they are crucial for certain lines of work... Just that those lines of work might not be representative of the user base.

tl;dr

I'm a graphics student so a scanner is an essential piece of kit for me. Graphic designers tantamount to being a 'visual jackdaw', we collect. Fantastic idea from that bank though! Can only hope it is safe enough to continue being used.

Plus, love this blog, can I get involved? I need to complain about Norton anti virus along with almost everything else ever made, ever.

Steve R-

Please do! I'm working the bugs out as to why members can't post- see the following thread to see the progress...

http://my.opera.com/community/forums/topic.dml?id=168194

A less then optimal solution would be for me to post for you in your name.

I too am a USAA member. They gave most of their customers $50.00 to buy a scanner. Luckily I already had one and I was able to keep the money. I use USAA for banking, Car insurance and homeowner insurance. I probably will be refiancing my mortage through them as well. Even the ATM fees are reembursable! It makes sence since they do not have spend billions of $$ on buildings and salaries, not to mention property taxes. I love USAA!! Everyone thinks that Bank of America sets the standard, not so USAA really sets the standard and I really believe that USAA is really ahead of their time and banking is going to go in this direction. Banking as we currently know it is really obsolete. I just hope that your new job is more online then at a branch. At least for the long haul. I can do everything from deposits to withdrawals. I was even able to do certified checks with a simple phone call. Security is not an issue with USAA. They know what they are doing. Every is secured by passwords and programs. Fraud can't happen if you know what you are doing. I have been a member for 6 years now and I have not had an issue. I can do more with USAA than I can at a bank or credit union. They even have finance/investments/stock brokers, children's car seat programs and so much more. It is truely a great program. USAA is also for people who can prove that their mom or dad served in the military without the "customer" serving a day in the military. I am not quite sure about the screening process, but I do know that you can become a member without serving in the military. Since I have served, my kids can become members and their kids can become member etc. Without ever serving in the military. It is worth looking into.

♠Ace♠ writes:

yes i like them =)

Anonymous writes:

Yes that Deposit at Home is great, however if you scan in a check that for someone reason comes back, you are up th creek and considered a fraud suspect, although you comitted no fraud. Beware, I work there so beware!

Anonymous writes:

Can anyone confirm whether a digital camera photo of sufficient resolution can be substituted for a scanned image? This is a critical consideration, as I'm not about to clutter my life up with a clunky scanner just to do this...

Anon-

I know when I tested it, the Mac version allowed you to upload an image to it (as it didn't have the mac drivers needed to drive the scanner from within the application).

But I can't say that you'll be able to do it with windows