It all depends on when you request the payment (minimum value of $100) and which country you reside in. Cheques are only issued twice a month so you need to make sure your request goes in before the cut-off period for accepting payments. Then you wait another week (at least) for the cheque to be posted. If you are outside the US or Canada they state 4-6 week delivery. In reality it takes about two weeks for the UK. I would expect it would be the same for Europe but cannot state that for sure.

Istockphoto used to be quite good at emailing a confirmation to you back after making a cheque request and also when the cheque was posted a few weeks later. Nowadays you don't get either, the only way you know that your requests has worked is that your on-screen balance immediately drops by the amount you requested.

I suspect their recent change in attitude to contributors that like cheque payments is due to that fact it costs them more. It also incurs a the price of a stamp. But they do buy the cheapest possible stamp which is why it takes so many weeks to arrive.