You can't do that here. There even was a major, major brouhaha when Visa and the rest started charging and keeping double the amount of money as a cash reserve i.e when you pay for a night in a hotel at 100 USD and 100 USD is deducted and 100 USD is reserved for 24-72 hrs. I ran into that when I tried getting my money out of the Union Bank of Norway's account (paypal's local bank) - they stated very clearly that they understood, and gave me tips on how to go about it, but they also stated very clearly that for any bank or financial entity to just go in to someone's bank account with a very sound reason, i.e automated payments like rent and mortgages and other stuff specified automated by me, any transaction or transfer given to that account wuould need to be approved by me. Cheques are actually pretty antiquated here, nobody uses them - it's all cards and smartcards and payment by cellphones. ~S