As a good practice, we have customers endorse checks made payable to "Cash". The intent, I believe, is to provide us evidence the customer received the funds.

However, can the bank be held responsible if a customer says they wrote a check to "Cash" and didn't get the money if the bank didn't get their endorsement?

I'm not sure about the second part of your question, but we also have the customer endorse checks made payable to "cash" or made payable to themself.

We used to have some customers make them payable to the Bank, but we've put a stop to that practice, unless they are actually making a payment of some kind to us (such as their loan payment).

I guess my question is, would our tellers be required for any legal reason to get the customer's endorsement?

Technically, no. A check made payable to cash is a bearer instrument and would require no endorsement. Customers would be better instructed to make checks payable to themselves. That way only they can cash them. If the check is lost or misplaced and it is made payable to cash, anyone can negotiate it.

We also stopped the practice of allowing them to make the check payable to the bank. Also, if the check payable to cash is over $50 we have them endorse it so we can "prove" who got the money.

It's really such a minor request that most customers would not object, although there is always that one customer who's done a little too much reading on the internet and just loves to act the victim when asked to do something he thinks he read he doesn't have to do.

A lot of banks could, if pressed, provide video proof that the customer actually cashed the check, right down to the denominations handed out by the teller. Even so, I recommend that the customer be asked to endorse such checks, and that customers be advised to make this sort of check payable to themselves as a security measure.