Social Security to end paper checks after Sept. 30
Source: Scripps News
Posted 3:06 PM, Jul 17, 2025 and last updated 3:08 PM, Jul 17, 2025
The Social Security Administration will stop sending monthly paper checks after Sept. 30.
The agency says fewer than 1% of Social Security recipients currently receive paper checks. Those individuals will need to opt in to direct deposit or a prepaid debit card option to continue receiving their benefits.
"We’re proactively sending notices to people who currently receive paper checks, to explain the upcoming change and highlight the benefits of switching to electronic payments," the agency said in a statement. Each notice will include a flyer outlining how beneficiaries can sign up for electronic payment options.
The agency says moving away from paper checks improves efficiency and reduces the risk of theft or delays. Paper checks are 16 times more likely to be lost or stolen than electronic payments, according to SSA.
Read more: https://www.scrippsnews.com/us-news/social-security-to-end-paper-checks-after-sept-30
Now THAT will cause a riot - especially in rural areas and small towns - and even some urban areas that are "banking deserts" (which is what prompted the push years ago, to allow Post Offices to offer limited banking).
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so you might get Ernestine, who was hired to crack the whip and speed things up!
Joe Biden tried to change it, and he tried to bring high-speed internet out to the Boonies.
where he would put the checks and would hand them out every other Friday. The secretary had the envelopes with printed copies of the paystubs (leave and earnings statement). The bank I used had a branch a block away from the office so at lunch, I would walk to it and deposit. A few years later, they closed that bank branch and I ended up walking about 4 blocks to another one.
Maybe for some, But most of these people probably go to a bank to cash the check anyway so what's the difference? I remember years ago more than once being handed a paper paycheck out in the rain on payday and hoping it wouldn't just melt in my wallet till I could get it to the bank. Trouble was the job didn't end till 5:00 and the banks were all closed then. The married guy's could get the wife to take it but guy's like me had to get someone else to or cash it that night at one of a couple of bars in town that kept enough cash on hand (200,000 on hand I learned later) to handle payroll checks, Not always a good Idea to be handed several hundred cash over the bar with other patrons looking on, ( early eighties, a few hundred was something) and Heh Heh, It tended to keep you at the bar later than you intended most times 
:
from back when it was still called the "Veterans Administration" before it became a Department), where he was in our local (Philly) COBOL programmers group who programmed the calculations for the distribution of Veteran's Benefits, which included the montly checks. I don't think they printed those (although they had plenty of tree killing with the punch cards and endless printouts ). I believe Treasury did that once the info was transmitted (through one of their offices).
…and no sarcasm, serious question, what do people do now when they get their checks id they don’t have a bank account? I get that they might go to a check cashing place to cash it,
As you note - they "go to a check cashing place to cash it". It is EXACTLY what they do. There are NO banks in their neighborhood. But these same neighborhoods will have little check-cashing places every couple blocks (along with the pawn shops, that I noticed are making a come-back).
They LITERALLY go to the utility company, all of which have offices around the city, and pay IN CASH. When they get their electric bill in the mail, once a month they will hop on a bus or trolley and go into the electric company's retail/customer location, and hand them the cash to pay the bill and get a receipt. There are cashiers there just for that purpose. Same with the gas company and the same even applies to the cable company (I know whenever I had to go to a Comcast outlet - for example, to return cable equipment, there would be a CSR there for people who were paying their bills and they were doing so with cash.
Many people in these neighborhoods are also renting (whether an apartment or a house), so they pay their landlord IN CASH.
As I said - they don't have any supermarkets or pharmacies in these poorer neighborhoods. That is why you see people use the term "food desert". It's the very definition of it. They rely on the "convenience stores" or Dollar Stores for food and household goods and any that do take credit cards, continually have the problem of the skimmers (which are also often stuck on self-serve gas station pump card readers) and the blown-up ATM machines.
Looking at your user name, I would tell you that these folks are the BOTTOM of the 99%.
People complain about why they eat at so many fast food restaurants - it's because "it's lunch" or "it's dinner" and whether a chain or one of the local food shops, they take (and often require) "cash" and are just about all that is available outside of being able to have access to a food pantry (and those are about to be completely wiped out with all the federal funding cuts).
ETA - this is a typical check-cashing place (there are also chains of them) - this one in the Kensington neighborhood in Philly by the El -
It's next door to a "mini market" that has groceries. They cash the checks, and in some cases, they can actually pay utility bills in those places, then buy some stuff in the mini-market, and then hop on public transit (or walk) back home.
