This article is from 2004: http://tucson.com/news/local/check-cashing-fees-starting-to-... -- so it's been going on for awhile.

I remember hearing someone sued BoA(?) for "failure to honor the face value of a check" and lost. After that, fee's started spreading. I can't find an online reference to this story.

In the UK at least all the supplied cheques I've seen for many years are pre-approved crossed. That is, they are explicitly not to be paid to the bearer in cash, but only into an account held by the named recipient.

This is the case in Australia too, cheques come with “|Not Negotiable|” pre-printed on them, meaning they cannot be cashed, only deposited to the recipient’s account. The words mean something completely different in the US, and writing them actually completely voids the cheque.

I wonder if you could put “for deposit only” in the endorsement spot to get the same effect. But why would you want to dictate how the check is used?

Here’s the best explanation I’ve found:

https://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showpost.php?s=0a4ad0b9...

Bank of Slumerica does this for one. It's funny because on the face of it, they're inducing their customers to commit fraud every time they write a check!