Electronic Check Presentment - ECP

Once upon a time, there was a thing called paper. It was an ancient technology used by primitive humans, where people would scratch messages on a processed piece of wood in order to record transactions or communicate information with each other.

One of the uses of this technology was to write checks. These paper communications allowed you to transfer money from your bank account into someone else's. Banks would literally have to mail these little scraps of paper (the actual checks, that is) to each other in order to get the funds moved. It tended to take a long time and forced banks to deal with a lot of paper, both sending it and storing it.

Electronic check presentment, or ECP, sped the process along and made it easier to handle. Instead of sending the physical paper check, ECP allows banks (and other financial institutions) to send digital images of checks. So, not the check itself, but a selfie of the check. (Well, the check didn't take the picture itself, but you get the point.)