President Donald Trump signed an executive order March 25 calling for the Treasury Department to use electronic payments instead of paper checks, a step aimed at reducing waste and fraud.
White House staff secretary Will Scharf pointed out some of the shortcomings of paper checks. “Historically, checks issued by the Treasury are, I believe, 14 times more likely to become the subject of fraud than electronic transfer payments,” he said.
Paper-based payments also impose unnecessary costs and delays, the order’s fact sheet said, adding that “maintaining the physical infrastructure and specialized technology for digitizing paper records cost the American taxpayer over $657 million in fiscal year 2024 alone.”…