I received a check that looks real with an Austalian scam letter. What would happen if I cashed it?

Your bank will come after you, because you will be the one to cash it. You will be responsible for repaying it, plus associated fees. If the check is large enough, your bank may even elect to call the police and have you charged with some type of fraud.

Go to the bank. They know if the bank exists. It won't cause you any problem as the most that will happen to you is that you get no money. If that company has no money in their bank account they will be charged a NSF fee for writing a cheque and not being able to cover it with sufficient funds. If the check is real, and you can prove your identity (most banks would rather have that you have an account with them) saving account or something - even if it has next to nothing in it...it is irrelevant. They are just protecting themselves from you "finding a check that does not belong to you". But they will cash it if it is legit. They want to make sure they get their money back from the other bank. I have never heard of all banks(the bank has a directory they can look into). If you go to a non-bank cashier, they do the same checks before they give you any money and they take off their service charges which can be pretty hefty for doing nothing. I get checks out of England, and there is no way I know the banks in England.. Hey, if my local bank pays me, it must be legit.

The bank would come after you. If you think even a little bit that the check might be counterfeit, forged, or in any way not good and you try to cash it you are committing a crime. At best the bank will simply take the money back out of your account. You may find yourself trying to explain why you cashed it to the police or FBI.

Even if you could cash the check, the money wouldn't come from the scammers. It's certainly not drawn on one of their own accounts. You wouldn't be getting back at them, but simply soaking some other victim.

If your bank actually accepted the check as a deposit they would eventually charge you for a returned item. I think it is safe to say that this check will not clear the system. Your bank will debit the amount from your account and charge you a fee. If you took out any of the money credited to your account you might be in an 'over draft' position, more fees. If your bank thought that you knowingly deposited a non-negotiable check then they can charge you with fraud.

Not worth the trouble. Light the BBQ with it, impress your friends.

Scams like these are pretty common. Your bank would definitely come after you, not the people who made the check. Your bank account would be in deficit $4,000.00 plus whatever fees you may have accrued due to lack of funds and the bank doesn't expect anybody except you to pay for that loss. It sucks. It's a lot of bull yet amazingly people tend to fall for it all the time!

When you get a bogus check, your bank can choose not to cash it until they've checked it out. However, if they do cash it, they will take the money out of your account to cover it should it bounce.

Most bogus checks are used to either get access to your account or to get you to cash them and then be subject to some sort of small print that you didn't see.

The check won't be honored and you will be hit with a returned check fee. They probably want you to deposit the check and send them the $4K so your account will be negative 104K. Yes you will probably be charged with check fraud.

It wouldn't cash, and you'd go through a big embarresstment,if not more