I’m pretty much a check writing dude. My weird way of providing an “air gap” in the way I do things so Skynet doesn’t get too out of control.
That being said, with the advent of “points” credit cards, I’ve slowly (very) switched over to just paying for everything the card, which I pay off every month. I’m down to writing zero checks.
The other day I had to write one, though, to cover the copay from a dentist appointment. Actually found a good one, and they run their practice, more or less, as catch and release, so you just get a bill in the mail for any copay due.
It was for $10. First check I’ve written in forever. I’ve got a roll of forever stamps, so not sure of the exact postage, but I think it made up a sizable percentage of the total cost.
But on topic, check run was the first stop in the pipeline after CFI when I was a youngin’. Late 80’s, there were tons of small operators, as well as the bigger ones like Airnet. The pipeline was so well established at my local field that there really wasn’t much of an interview process. The person in front of you simply handed the job off to the next person with a phone call to their boss when they moved up the pipeline. 1,200 TT was the magic number.
Recession of 90 blew that whole program up. Where you were was where you were when the music stopped, and then things got ugly.