Any good check printing programs?

[Mikkel L. Ellertson]

Gene Heskett wrote:
> 
> I think you are wasting your time unless you just want to fill in the 
> blanks of a ready-made, purchased from the bank, check.
> 
> The reason?  They are custom imprinted with a magnetic pattern that 
> contains the information to route and clear that check, with only the 
> amount being required to be read and entered by hand at the clearing 
> point.
> 
> We don't have the facilities to do that for an otherwise identical looking 
> check, and if we did, I imagine the secret service would come to pay a 
> visit, probably without knocking other than the door in to gain entrance.
> They tend to take a very dim view of counterfeiting, which could easily be 
> done with essentially the same printing equipment.
> 
Just about any laser printer can print checks with the magnetic
encoding. The hard part is getting the toner cartridge with the
magnetic ink. But they are available. You do have to be a bit
careful of the check layout - too much artwork can give the readers
problems. It also get expensive as the magnetic ink cost more. One
way around this is to use a color laser printer, and replace one of
the toner cartridges with the magnetic ink. You have to do the
layout so that you do not use the magnetic ink except in the
account/routing information, and only use the magnetic ink there.
There is a font for producing the account/routing information. As an
added benefit, you can encode the check amount when you print the
check. (I don't remember all the details any more - the setup was
15-20 years ago, with a monochrome laser printer.)

Mikkel
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