But making a dent in the large number of paper checks in the country's banking system is clearly one advantage to electronic banking. Today, the cost of moving checks through the banking system is estimated to be approximately 80 cents per check, including the costs of paper, printing, and mailing. The national payment mechanism moves money between accounts in a fast, paperless way. Consumers can do their banking without the assistance of a teller, as John Jones did to get cash, or to make deposits, pay bills, or transfer funds from one account to another electronically. To pay for a purchase, the consumer presents an EFT card instead of a check or cash.
Money is taken out of the consumer's account and put into the merchant's account electronically.
Preauthorized Transfers . For example, consumers can authorize direct electronic deposit of wages, social security, or dividend payments to their accounts. Or, they can authorize financial institutions to make regular, ongoing payments of insurance, mortgage, utility or other bills. Telephone Transfers . A check information that authorizes a bank to withdraw a certain amount of money from one person's account and pay that amount to another person.