Continued adventures with online check processing after AT&T sent me a $10 check (to reimburse me after I cancelled DSL about 3 months ago).

Tried this evening to deposit-by-picture... Light background, dark background... No luck. When I pressed submit the 3rd time on the Wells Fargo Android App, this is what filled my screen:

Didn't exactly fill me with confidence, so I installed the Chase Android app -- had better luck with that one, first submit resulted in success.

For the past few months, I seem to spend a good part of waking weekends going to Wells Fargo to deposit a myriad of physical checks:

• A whopper of a check from Luminate for hitting payout!
• A monthly check from Hamstra
• A monthly check from Brown Paper Tickets
• Random reimbursement checks from Wage Works

These checks have all arrived just far apart that, had I tried batching them, I'd lose them before depositing them.

This morning, instead of the regular weekend trip to the bank I decided to try the Wells Fargo "Mobile Deposit" service:

The application was easy to use:

• Install Wells Fargo app from Play Store
• Provide login credentials
• Select prominently displayed "Mobile Deposit" function
• Choose deposit account
• Specify check amount
• Take pictures of front and back of endorsed check (unfortunately no QR Code-style auto-check-detection shutter-click by the app: you're responsible for making sure the check is cropped and in focus)
• Upload pictures and click "submit"
• Wait 15 minutes watching a little spinner not make any progress

Yeah, that last step was a bit annoying. With my check in a Mike Teavee limbo, I didn't want to just kill the unconvincing progress spinner: I called Wells Fargo.

The lady on the phone said she could see my pictures and they seemed legible, but the server logged them as "failed to process" with no additional details (or, apparently, feedback to the client). She recommended I kill the app and retry using a *white* background instead of the in-app recommendation to use a *black* background (I had used a mousepad).

The second time around things went as smoothly as a Chase commercial: a second after I clicked submit I had a 15-digit confirmation code displayed on my phone (that I could not select, copy, or have emailed to me -- the lady recommended I write it down... on paper. How high-tech).

Now I'm supposed to keep the check around for a few weeks until I'm confident the funds are in my account... Good luck with that.

If it works: new trick. w00t.

Now I have to go Hunt the Wumpus...