Writing first french cheque :/ Joint account, who signs?

[mafoo]

Hi All :)

Just a quick question. I am about to write my first french cheque. I know where everything goes but the cheque will be drawn from a joint account and I have no idea if it needs to be signed by both parties or just one. I remember reading somewhere how you can tell but can't find it for the life of me and have to get this cheque out this morning.

Can anyone help?

Thank you,

Matt

[jc]

It depends how your names are printed on the cheque;if shown as "ou" either can sign;if "et" then both must sign.

[mafoo]

Thank you so much for the quick reply. Very much appreciated. That's what I thought. We have ¨et¨ on it, so we both have to sign.

Out of curiousity, if we use a cheque in a shop to buy something, do we both have to be present or can one party sign the cheque before hand and the person present sign it when we pay? What a nightmare.

We purchased an old barn last month and are now having to start to pay for things and the language barrier is proving interesting *laughs*. We have both been learning French for some time but it still makes the more formal/legal stuff interesting.

Thanks again for your help :)

[Suze01]

The other problem with having an account where you both have to sign is that in the eventuality of one of you dying the account will be frozen and the survivor won't be able to access the money in the account (I stand to be corrected but that is my understanding).

[mafoo]

Hrm. Might be trying to get that changed then. Not that I plan on dying soon.

I just want to make 100% sure I am doing this correctly. My first cheque is for 1700e, do I just put ¨Mille sept cents euro¨? The second is for 7000e, so do I just put ¨sept mille euro¨?

Although I have been learning French for a while, I have never really had to put it to a practical use and are now starting to doubt it.

[Suze01]

Yes, Mafoo, you're correct in your number-writing.

[cooperlola]

But add an s to euro.

[mafoo]

Thank you for reassuring my paranoia :)

I was told today not to put an ¨s¨ on the end of the euro *laughs*. I trust this source more though, so will.

 

[cooperlola]

Well put it this way, I always use an s and none of my cheques have ever been sent back![:D]

[jc]

The "s" doesn't matter and you can write the cents in figures tho' most cheques state "toutes lettres".

[fussy]

I think the cheque signing queiery needs to be checked (pardon the pun) I have just looked at our cheque book and it has et but only one of us ever signs at a time.

[Clair]

[quote]... pour permettre une grande souplesse de fonctionnement l'intitulé du

compte est le plus souvent "M. ou Mme..." (pour un couple). En effet,

si le compte a été ouvert sous l'intitulé "M. et Mme...", la signature

des deux co-titulaires du compte est nécessaire pour toutes les opérations.[/quote]

source: Les clés de la banque

[chessfou]

And if you want to have the numbers correct, they should be written:

1.700 in French rather than the English version 1,700

and 7.000 rather than 7,000.

If you need to add any cents, then you use a comma (not a full stop), e.g.:

1.700,25

It will also help if you put a little horizontal bar through the middle of the stem of your 7s.

[Loiseau]

[quote user="Suze"]The other problem with having an account where you both have to sign is that in the eventuality of one of you dying the account will be frozen and the survivor won't be able to access the money in the account (I stand to be corrected but that is my understanding).
[/quote]

Quite right.  After my husband died, the bank told me the account was *not* frozen as it had been in the names Monsieur OU Madame, and not ET.

However, I think there was an issue about the cashpoint card/carte bleue.  I had to be issued with a new one of those.

Angela