We still have cheques in germany. They're rarely used and of limited usefulness ...

We still have cheques in germany. They're rarely used and of limited usefulness in most cases, but if you want to hand over large amounts of money, they can be useful [1]. Our Ex-President Wulff notably received the loan for his house via check.

[1] Auctions for example, where the payment must be delivered immediately and cash would be impractical. Usually, in that case, a "Bundesbankscheck" is used which is as good as cash: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Best%C3%A4tigter_Bundesbank-Sch...