We are more than happy to exchange personal US$ cheques for you, although we do prefer money orders and cashiers cheques.
To minimise the possibility of having a cheque returned due to insufficient funds,please could you send them to us for processing as soon as you can, .......... also it helps if you state in your listings something like :

"Personal cheques accepted, goods may be shipped on clearance (upto 28 days)"

.....this really does make buyers think twice before sending a rubber cheque , and we will of course process personal cheques by return as normal ! (High value personal checks may be held until cleared)

Also : You need to inform senders of personal US$ checks that 'Checks Verified Through NorthStar Technologies'

To clarify what happens when we process a personal cheque :

All our cheques are processed by the bank 'on negotiation' which means that they credit our account with the funds within 10 days, we of course send your payment by return of post. Should a cheque 'bounce' neither us nor the proceesing bank will know anything for upto 28 days, then our account is debited with the sterling value of the returned cheque, sometimes they also charge us £10 for this, but not always. We then have to inform you what has happened and ask for the money back, either by deducting the US$ amount from your next sendings to us, or by a sterling payment to us. In some cases we reserve the right to withhold payment on high value personal cheques untill they have cleared.

Not wishing to cause alarm, but the incidence of 'bounced' cheques is still less than 1% overall, with an approximate 75% success rate on the buyer making good the returned cheque !