- 1). Examine your check to determine what your due date was. If you have received your dividend check within the last six months, you might not need to do anything except take it down to your local bank to cash it. If you have a long history with your own bank, it is typically better to use it, so that you don't encounter any problems with getting the check cashed. However, you can also go to the bank that issued the check on behalf of the company you invested in.
- 2). Determine whether your stale-dated check is cashier's check or a certified check. Banks will generally go ahead and honor these, because the rule that applies to stale-dated checks only applies to those coming from a checking account. Uniform Commercial Code or UCC §4-404 mandates that banks are not obligated to pay on checks older than six months. However, you can still try to have the check cashed. Some banks will do so in good faith, so long as you pay a nominal fee.
- 3). Contact the customer service department of your brokerage firm or whoever issues your dividend statements. Explain your situation, and request that they issue you a new check for the amount on the expired dividend check. You should be able to have this issued with little problem, although it might take some time for the check to arrive, since the company will have to process paperwork, account for the old check and go through the process of printing the new check.
- 4). Consider another option for future checks. Most stock and mutual fund companies offer the opportunity to reinvest quarterly dividends in more shares at the current market value. This gives you the opportunity to grow the principal of your investment over time and gain a larger share of the company.
- 5). Place your checks somewhere where you will have easy access to them in the future. If you decide not to reinvest the dividends in more company shares, then you should at least try to avoid having another stale-dated check. When a company goes bankrupt, your check will no longer be valid, and you will be left with a piece of paper and a reminder of what could have been.