My bank, for example, guarantees to cash everything up to $400 over what I have in my account. So If I accidentally bounced a check, it will still go through as long as it isn't over $400 bucks. Now they would charge me if I did that and I haven't ever used it. But just letting you know that many banks will go ahead and process it. Then again, if your person has a history of not having money in his account then you might have a hard time.
But somebody else made a good point. I'd go there everyday or every PAY day and try to cash that check at his/her bank.
and if you did do it you would find that even though your bank guarantees to cash it, if it bounces they will charge you for the amount of the check in addition to a fee-and if it causes your account to overdraw they will charge you a fee for every check or debit charge that bounces-and most banks purposely set up their systems such that your largest charges are processed first in the batch each night (so if you deposit a bad check for $300 and assume you have $500 in the bank and do one check for $199 and 10 checks/debits for the remaining $301-they will process the $199 first so they can hit you for 10 overdraws, not process the others up to the amount of $199 so you just get hit with the minimum amount of overdraws).
most banks won't cash a check without a fee for a non customer-you do best to walk in or call to verify funds-and verify they have'nt done a stop payment and then deposit (but don't withdraw or write checks on) into your own account.
