Originally Posted by
yellow77
My guess, given the origin of that trip, is somewhere Nordic. Many European countries phased out checks/cheques a long time ago, the Nordic countries being in the vanguard.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cheque#Western_Europe. If that's the case, then 'the 1970's' is a bit of an exaggeration, but it has been a while...
Exactly, "In Finland, banks stopped issuing personal cheques in about 1993. All Nordic countries have used an interconnected international Giro system since the 1950s, and in Sweden cheques are now totally abandoned. Also electronic payments across the European Union are now fast and low-cost."
I started my banking early 80's and I have never received a cheque book nor used one. My recall of cheques is from the 70's when my father used them somewhere occasionally. He used them to pay at the shops, not to deposit money to his account at the bank. And yes, I did have to ask the AA person what I do with the cheque, do all shops accept it or how does it work.
If they stop the cheques in 1993, that means that there's been very little use for them 10+ years before that..