Cheques are being phased out — and this one has a date on it

Most of what we write about is a judgement call. This one isn't. Australia's cheque system is being wound down on a published national timetable, and the dates are already set.

If you still write cheques — for the church, for the gardener, for a grandchild's birthday, for the club you're treasurer of — this affects you directly, and it's worth ten minutes now rather than a scramble later. This article is general information only, not personal advice.

What are the two dates, and why are there two?

The Australian Government announced its Cheques Transition Plan on 18 November 2024, and it sets a two-step wind-down. Cheques stop being issued from 30 June 2028 — that covers personal, commercial, government and bank cheques. Cheques stop being accepted from 30 September 2029, after which financial institutions will not process them (Treasury, https://treasury.gov.au/publication/p2024-555854, as at August 2026).

The gap between those dates confuses people, and the reason for it is neat once you know it. A cheque goes stale fifteen months after it is drawn — meaning it can no longer be banked. The milestone dates were deliberately set so that every cheque written right up to the last day of issuance has gone stale by the final day of acceptance (Treasury). So the fifteen-month window isn't a grace period anyone should plan around. It's the tail end of the system emptying itself out.

The Australian Payments Network, the payments industry's self-regulatory body, is coordinating the industry's transition work (https://auspaynet.com.au/insights/Cheques_Transition).

One more thing worth knowing: for some people this has effectively already happened. Cheque use has fallen by around 90% over the past decade, and many institutions have already stopped issuing chequebooks to new customers (Treasury). If yours has, you're simply early to a change everyone is making.

Why does this land hardest on people like you?

Let me say the honest thing before the practical advice, because the usual coverage of this skips it.

The people still writing cheques are, in the main, older. And a lot of them are doing it deliberately rather than out of inertia. A cheque is a record — it has a butt, a number, a date. It's slow enough to reconsider, which is a feature, not a bug. It doesn't require a smartphone, a password or a two-factor code. It can be posted, which matters if getting to a branch is hard.

It has been a perfectly good system for fifty years, and it's being withdrawn not because it failed you but because almost everyone else stopped using it. That's a genuine loss and it's reasonable to be annoyed about it.

Right. Now the useful part.

What actually breaks — and what replaces it?

Easier to think about by what you use cheques for than by what a cheque is.

For donations to the church, a charity or the local op shop, most organisations now take direct debit, BPAY or card, and many prefer it. Ask the organisation what they'd like — for regular giving, a direct debit is generally the closest equivalent to a standing habit. Our article on charitable giving in retirement covers the wider picture.

For tradespeople and small suppliers, it's a bank transfer, usually from the invoice. This is the one that carries the scam risk — see the next section, and please don't skip it.

For gifts to grandchildren, a transfer needs their account details, which you may not have and may feel awkward asking for. Worth sorting out before a birthday rather than during one.

Clubs, committees and treasurer duties are genuinely under-discussed here. The dual-signature cheque account — where two people had to sign — was a real internal control, and a good one. Electronic banking can do the equivalent through dual authorisation, but it doesn't configure itself; somebody has to set it up deliberately. If you're on a committee, raise it now rather than letting the treasurer discover it in 2028.

Deceased estates matter too, because executors have historically leaned heavily on cheques — they're clean, traceable and don't require setting up payees for one-off payments. If you're acting as an executor, get the electronic arrangements sorted early; our articles on deceased estate administration and on what being an executor involves cover the wider job.

And bank cheques, used for property settlement and other large one-off payments, are explicitly in scope (Treasury). If you're contemplating a property transaction anywhere near these dates, raise it with your conveyancer early. Bank cheques are also a counter product, which ties into a related problem — our article on what to do when your bank branch closes covers that side.

What scam does this transition create?

This is the most important practical warning in the article.

When you pay by bank transfer instead of cheque, you have to type in account details. And that is precisely where payment redirection scams operate. Scammers "pretend to be from a business you've used and send you an invoice with new payee information," sometimes by hacking a legitimate email account and "intercepting legitimate invoices and amending the bank details before releasing emails to the intended recipients" (Scamwatch, https://www.scamwatch.gov.au/about-us/news-and-alerts/scam-alert-fake-business-invoice-scams, as at August 2026). And they are convincing: Scamwatch notes that scammers "can make invoices look like the real thing by copying logos and ABNs."

Someone moving from cheques to transfers for the first time is unusually exposed, for a reason that isn't about being careless: a cheque never required you to verify account details, so you have no habit of doing it.

So build the habit deliberately, starting with your first transfer, and Scamwatch states the rule plainly: "take the time to call the business you are dealing with – using contact details you've found independently – to check the payment details are correct," and "don't use the contact details in the email as they might have been changed by the scammer." Do it for tradespeople, for any large payment, and any time details appear to have changed. Our article on scams targeting older Australians covers the wider patterns, and our piece on online security for retirees covers doing electronic banking safely.

Scamwatch also suggests something that maps directly onto the club-treasurer problem above: "consider a multi-person approval process for transactions over a certain dollar threshold" (https://www.scamwatch.gov.au/types-of-scams/business-email-compromise-scams). That is the electronic descendant of the two-signature chequebook, and it's worth asking your bank for by name.

Is cash also being phased out?

Worth stating clearly, because it's easy to read "cheques are ending" as "physical money is ending." It isn't the same thing at all — the policy directions are opposite, and the cash side has now commenced.

The cash acceptance codes started on 1 January 2026, with penalties applying from 1 July 2026 (ACCC, https://www.accc.gov.au/business/industry-codes/cash-acceptance-industry-codes, as at August 2026). Under them, consumers must be able to pay in cash at certain supermarket and fuel retail sites, for in-person payments of $500 or less, between 7am and 9pm. Small businesses with aggregate annual turnover under $10 million are exempted, though the mandate does apply to a small business that shares a trademark with a larger retailer (Treasury, https://ministers.treasury.gov.au/ministers/jim-chalmers-2022/media-releases/mandating-cash-acceptance). The ACCC enforces compliance.

Be precise about the limits, because they matter: the codes "do not apply to any other industries" (ACCC). This is a protection for groceries and fuel, not a general right to pay cash everywhere. But the direction of travel is unmistakably different from cheques — cash is being protected by law while cheques are being retired. If you budget in cash, you are not on this clock. Our article on managing money as things go cashless covers where that stands.

What do the worked examples show?

Two situations where the dates actually bite. Illustrative only, and not personal advice.

Consider Norma, 74, treasurer of a bowls club whose account has required two signatures since 1988 — a control that has quietly protected the club for decades. She has until 30 June 2028 to write the last cheque and 30 September 2029 before any remaining cheque goes unbankable (Treasury). The trap is that the club's protection lives in the chequebook, not in the bank account: moving to electronic payments without configuring dual authorisation would silently remove a control the committee has relied on for nearly forty years, and Scamwatch's own advice for exactly this risk is a multi-person approval process above a set threshold. On these facts, raising dual authorisation at a committee meeting well before 2028 is generally rational — it is a decision the club makes deliberately, or one it makes by accident.

Now consider Frank and Susan, both 71, planning to downsize in 2028. Two things collide for them. Bank cheques are in scope for the phase-out (Treasury), so a settlement near the June 2028 date needs the payment method confirmed with their conveyancer rather than assumed. And once settled, they will be paying trades — a plumber, a painter, a removalist — by transfer for the first time in their lives, with no established habit of checking account details, which is precisely the gap payment redirection scams exploit. On these facts, raising the settlement question early and adopting the ring-and-confirm rule on the very first tradesperson's invoice is generally rational, because both problems cost minutes in advance and a great deal afterwards.

What should you do now, not in 2028?

None of this is urgent this week, and all of it is easier now than under a deadline.

Start by writing down which of your regular payments still go by cheque — most people find it's fewer than they thought, often three or four. Then ask each recipient what else they accept; the church, the charity and the gardener will generally have an answer ready. Set up one electronic method properly, with someone helping you, rather than three badly; our article on myGov and online services covers the related setup. Start the ring-and-confirm habit with your very first transfer.

If you're an attorney or executor, sort electronic access early — our article on getting a power of attorney accepted explains why doing that in advance matters so much. If you're on a committee, raise dual authorisation at the next meeting. And check whether your own institution has already stopped issuing chequebooks, which would move your personal deadline forward regardless of the national dates.

If any of this feels like more than you want to take on alone, our article on the free help that already exists lists services that will sit down and work through it with you at no cost.

Sources

• Treasury — Australia's Cheques Transition Plan
• Treasury Ministers — Ensuring the future of cash and next steps in phasing out cheques
• Australian Payments Network — Cheques Transition
• ACCC — Cash Acceptance Industry Codes
• ACCC — About the cash acceptance mandate and codes
• Treasury Ministers — Mandating cash acceptance
• Scamwatch — Scam alert: Fake business invoice scams
• Scamwatch — Business email compromise scams