I still write 2 cheques a year because my water bill can only be paid via physical mail (or in person I guess), I’m pretty sure fax is still common in our medical industry.
What is it with water departments being such Luddites?! Having lived in a few different cities in a few different states, they always seem to be the one utility that’s the biggest pain in the ass to work with. Gotta go down to their city office to start service - make sure to bring a voided check if you want to set up an auto draft to pay the bill because they don’t take cards. Online account management? Nah, the closest they have to an online presence is their About page on the city website.
I use a check for Rumpke for the same reason, but my checkbook is still useful for when a co-worker brings in their kid's fundraiser and i can quickly write ine out
I still write checks, mostly to pay contractors and tip my hairdresser. I wrote a tip for a contractor the other day and made it out to cash. He said that was too old-school and he was afraid the bank wouldn't accept it!
I'm in the USA and we've been able to file our federal taxes for free online for like a decade, I'm not sure what these people are talking about. What's new here is that this is the IRS's official tool.
Previously we had to use an outside service -- but it was -- and still is -- free for normal people/people with normal taxes (eg I have 3 kids and a mortgage and I use it every year). State taxes are another story -- that's usually about $20. And that probably hasn't changed; state taxes have nothing to do with our IRS.
Except for the last several years it’s becoming harder to file for free. TurboTax’s free service developed some worse and worse dark patterns every year, where it was very easy to click the wrong thing and end up being charged. Iirc the fact that they provided a free service at all was to keep control of the market and prevent the IRS from stepping in with a service like this. ProPublica did some good investigations on this.
Higher tax bracket Lemmings, note that Donate icon in the upper right of their excellent reporting. Reporters probably risking their lives with the stuff they uncover about the most powerful people.