Re: Cheque printing direct from the iSeries.

[Wayne McAlpine <wayne.mcalpine@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

There are turnkey solutions out there from vendors like Acom that 
produce the entire check on blank check stock.  They use a special laser 
printers that support MICR (magnetic ink character recognition?) 
printing.  Many stock printers can be converted to print MICR. 
Typically the checks are printed on stock that includes a self mailer. 
These require a separate device to fold and seal the envelope.  You've 
seen these checks with the perforated edges that have to be torn off to 
open it.

The other alternative is to roll your own and print to pre-printed and 
numbered checks.  Typically these are continuous form checks that are 
printed on an impact dot-matrix or band printer.  The check forms can be 
 purchased in several configurations, i.e., carbon copies,  These 
checks can be burst by hand or by machine and processed by normal 
mailroom folder/inserter machines.  There is RPG shareware available to 
produce the spelled-out amount on the check face.

Typically the MICR checks are used for high-volume processing and the 
impact printers for more moderate operations.

But the best way to handle payment processing is to use EFT.  Your bank 
can easily set you up to upload your data and they will do the funds 
transfer for you, usually for far less than what it would cost to 
produce paper checks.  Our check printing project was shelved 
permanently once we started looking into EFT.

Hope this helps as a starting point.

Wayne



Eduard Sluis wrote:
> Dear all,
>  
> For one of our customers we are to print cheques direct on a cheque printer.
> This Cheque printing requires a bit more than normal printing because we want 
> to be damn sure that the cheque is printed and is printed only once and ....?!
>  
> I have to assume that we are not the first ones to do so and that perhaps this is a very common thing to do.
> What we would like to know is:
> - Are tools available to do this?
> - What kind of printers are suitable?
> - Are there routines available to use with specific printers?
> - Anything to think about we might overlook?
> - Any experience that could help us!!
>  
> Any help/response appreciated.
> Kind regards,
> Eduard Sluis.