>>Paper checks ? you must be joking. It's at least years ago that i saw or wrote one of those. Are Am. banks really that far behind ?

It's not the banks. The banks would love to see checks disappear.
It's the companies that still pay many bills by check.
In many instances our financial managements' mindsets and the related A/P and A/R computer systems are stuck back in the 80's and 90's somewhere.
At 1%, "float" is hardly worth what it was when rates were as high as 18%.
But that's changing, however slowly, and when it picks up speed and managments wake up to the cost saving potential, checks will disappear in a hurry.