Treasurer
Print a check onto your bank's stock
Line PTO HQ's fields up with the pre-printed stock your bank gave you, then print payments onto it.
When you are done
You will have measurements that match your own check stock, and a printed check whose fields land in the right boxes.
Calibrate on plain paper first
Do this before you feed a single real check through the printer. Check stock is not standardized — the same bank ships different layouts — so the measurements PTO HQ starts with are unlikely to be right for your stock.
Open a payment from the register and print it on ordinary paper.
Hold that sheet against a real check from your stock, up to the light.
Measure how far each field needs to move, in millimeters, and adjust it on the check printing settings page.
Every measurement is from the top-left corner of the sheet.
Print on plain paper again and compare. Repeat until it lines up.
Only then use real stock. A check that prints wrong is a numbered check you have to void and account for.
Set the ten measurements
Ten measurements, two for each of the five fields: a distance from the left and a distance from the top.
- Anything outside a letter sheet is refused. A measurement over 280mm is a typo, and printing off the page wastes a real check.
| Field | From the left | From the top |
|---|---|---|
| The date | 150mm | 20mm |
| Who you are paying | 20mm | 36mm |
| The amount in figures | 168mm | 36mm |
| The amount written out | 20mm | 48mm |
| The memo | 20mm | 72mm |
Print the payment
Open the payment from the register and choose to print a check.
PTO HQ fills in the date, who you are paying, the amount in figures, the amount written out, and the memo.
Feed your own check stock.
PTO HQ draws no check of its own. Your paper already carries the routing number, the account number and your unit's name, and printing a second check on top of that would be a check no bank accepts.
- The written-out amount is the one that matters. Where the words and the figures disagree, banks pay what the words say, which is why the line is there at all — a $64.19 payment prints as Sixty-four and 19/100 beside the figures.
How to check it worked
- A plain-paper print held against real stock shows each field inside its box.
- The amount in words matches the amount in figures.
- The check number on the register entry matches the number pre-printed on the stock you fed in.
If it did not work
| What you see | What it means | What to do |
|---|---|---|
| PTO HQ refuses to print a check for a transaction. | Some payments cannot be a check: money coming in, a zero, a line with nobody named as the payee, and a transfer between two of your own accounts. | Check the transaction is money going out, has an amount above zero, and names a payee. A transfer between your own accounts is not paid by check. |
| The fields print in the right order but all shifted the same way. | The printer's own margin differs from the one the measurements assume. | Adjust every field by the same amount in the same direction rather than one at a time. |
| A measurement is refused. | It is outside a letter sheet. The accepted range is 0 to 280mm. | Re-measure from the top-left corner of the sheet, not from the edge of the check. |