Lawrence Ashland Currency Exchange

Went here for my city vehicle sticker. They charge a fee to pay with a credit card, then run the transaction as a cash advance so I get socked with a $ 10 fee by my credit card company. Apparently this is something they choose not to disclose up front. If you need a vehicle sticker, pay cash, or better yet, don’t go here and do it online to avoid all the hassle.

In my first ever auto registration and title transfer in Chicago they gave me a great service. Actually saved me a lot of time and money. These guys are great!

I’ve been to currency exchanges all over Chicagoland (in the city and in the suburbs) and in about 15 years of this, I’ve found this to be the hands-​down worst one when it comes to check cashing. (Haven’t used their other services; don’t know how good they are there.)
They have a very strange check cashing policy: they MUST have a phone number for the check that has a reverse lookup on
. In addition to the usual ID etc. The normal ID stuff I expect. But the random requirement of a reverse phone lookup? That’s BS. As everyone knows, in 2014 LOTS of places use VOIP or cellphone service or other non-​traditional services which do not publicly publish the name of the person or company who has the phone line like old-​timer landline companies used to. Very real companies have legit phone numbers that don’t have the reverse lookup in place. And also, what makes
a website and service that is considered reliable enough that financial judgements can be made on the weight of its data? Their about page literally says it was born out of someone’s dorm room. How does this make it an adequate service for deciding if a check should be cashed or not?
The first check I brought here was when I withdrew my Merrill Lynch IRA after being laid off. I had all my ML paperwork in order, and my ID, and they even called Merril Lynch and spoke to them. Then they said no. And I had to raise a fuss for the manager to «generously» allow this check to be cashed. Merrill-​effing-​Lynch. That tells you something about this phone number policy, eh? When even major financial institutions’s data doesn’t necessarily pull up using it?
The second check I tried was my first paycheck from the company I work for now, which has been in business since the 1940s! Oh, and I magically wasn’t in the system already as a customer, despite having visited them before. Ultimately I couldn’t get my check cashed here because the phone number didn’t pull up on
and I had to go elsewhere. Or come back tomorrow and deal with that manager again. I went elsewhere and had my money quickly. But it’s a longer walk from my house.
So I smell something fishy going on here. If I had to take a good guess, the location is not actually in the business of check cashing except as a token.
Because otherwise the facts make no sense. See, it sounds really good to say that using this arbitrary website will cut down fraud. Nobody ever wants to look like they’re FOR fraud, even if the measures supposedly being used to defeat it don’t actually work. But the facts work BETTER if you think of it as a way to lower the amount of checks you cash while SAYING you’re trying to defeat fraud. It’s PR, right? «We are doing these totally meaningless lookups based on a premise that is incorrect, so that you think we are really doing something, while we achieve our goal of doing something completely different!»
Look, I used to work in retail. I actually used to work a returns desk in retail. I MET people trying to swindle the company I worked for (and me). I know not everything is peaches and cream, especially in a city as big as Chicago. There are con men (and women!) out there. I’ve even seen some of the check-​cashing scams – a company I worked for was once sent a check from a church, and it turned out the church actually had had them physically stolen at some point and the thief was trying to buy things with them.
But when these guys have a policy in place that is flawed from a logical and common sense perspective (mainly, that it will prevent lots of legit people from cashing), you have to start looking for other motives. A business CAN’T rely on crappy data. But this one is, by their own policy – why? Why? There has to be a reason. I don’t believe the manager is really an old man still living in the 80s when phone books published everyone’s name and address. It’s more likely that they have a greater reason for driving away what would have been legitimate business. It makes more sense if you wonder if they’re making their profits off of other things and don’t actually need to cash checks to stay afloat as a company.
Oh, and guess who finally cashed my check? Chase. I hate Chase. I’ve had issues with them in the past. Yet they actually 1-​upped this place! What does THAT tell you?

So I visit this place to cash my tax refund check which I have done every year for several years. The first time, I had to give everything but a blood sample, including showing my tax returns, to get approved for this and was told after that, no problem, you’re in our system. Smooth sailing the next year. This year, I waited more than 30 days to cash my check. I guess. They won’t cash it. Displeased, but no problem really. Except they had already endorsed, and already had me endorse, the check. So where ever I go, they are going to ask, why did some other place not want to take the check and… why should we? This is a treasury check. There is an online system for them to verify the check is good. They did so, they were huddled over the computer for five minutes. Thanks a million for leaving me in a worse position than I was in when I walked in, and basically not really even caring. Now I am sure I’m going to have to request a new check and wait a month.