To a lawyer from a country party to the Geneva Convention Providing a Uniform Law for Cheques (of 19 March 1931) and the Geneva Convention Providing a Uniform Law for Bills of Exchange and Promissory Notes (of 7 June 1930), some of the rules in the common law countries regarding cheques may seem somewhat strange. This does not, however, make those rules less important, considering the role of the common law countries, such as the United Kingdom, the United States and Australia, in world trade. Short presentations of their law of cheques, although probably mainly intended for law students and other readers in the author’s own country, are thus of value for foreign lawyers too. This also applies to the reviewed book, which presents the Australian law of cheques and payment orders as it is after the passage of the Australian Cheques and Payment Orders Act of 1986.

In Australia, as well as in the other common law countries, the cheque has been tradi-