Check Truncation, What Does It Mean To You?

By Vicki Amendola, Integrated Solutions magazine

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the word truncate means to shorten, as if by cutting off. In the banking and finance industry, check truncation is the terminology used to describe the physical removal of paper checks from payment and deposit processes. If you can remember the days of receiving a monthly bank statement with an envelope full of cancelled checks, then you easily understand the impact of truncation. Now that bank statement comes with a few pages of check images, rather than a stack of processed checks. Some banks have even stopped sending check images, opting to provide a secure, online site to post the images for review instead.