Here’s how ECM swindles people: you sign up for a contract term. The term begins the instant you sign up – not when the account is usable. The account is not usable until after you go get some forms notarized, and snail mail them to their Oregon office. They state right in the lengthy user agreement that they will in fact return to sender any mail they receive before the notarized forms are received. If you ask them to honor their 1 year contractual obligation from the date the account becomes usable, they refuse. If you tell them to honor the contract, or cancel it, they will terminate the account — AND THEY WILL KEEP THE SETUP FEE (claiming that it’s non-refundable per their “money-back guarantee”)

For a while now, Earth Class Mail has been promising that they’ll provide an automatic check processing service. We’re eagerly awaiting their implementation of this feature as we’d use it in a heartbeat.