Shalom,
Could you please help me with the following?
I gave a check to a store which bounced. I was in there recently and the owner’s wife mentioned this to me. However, her husband on the spot said “not to worry about it”. I was not sure what he meant (perhaps I should have asked), and forgot about it.
Then they called a few days later and said that they had tried to re-deposit it and it had bounced again. I went in there to discuss it with them.
My claim is that the 1st time the check bounced was my responsibility, so that I need to cover the check and any “bounced check” fees, but that they should pay the fee for the 2nd time the check bounced, for they should not have tried to re-deposit it before discussing it with me. If they had, I could have done something about it.
The owner claims that the reason he deposited it again is because he thought that it had bounced the 1st time due to an error on his part and not due to insufficient funds in my account. My response is that this was his mistake, not mine.
So the question is…who should pay the bank fees for the 2nd time the check bounced?
Answer:
The second time the check bounced it was not on account of your negligence, but due to a misunderstanding. This was not your fault, and therefore you don’t have to pay for it.
However, you do have to pay for the first time the check bounced, since it is clear that the store-owner did not mean to forego the fees incurred, and was rather unaware of the fact that the check bounced because of insufficient cover.
Best wishes.
