Cash is holding strong as a consumer payment instrument. According to the Federal Reserve 2018 Diary of Consumer Payment Choice, cash was the most used payment type among US consumers—representing 36% of all payments. Cash is easy to use, safe to use, private, and generally accepted everywhere. As Mercator Advisory Group’s Director of Debit & Alternative Products Sara Grotta explains, the decline in cash use will be very gradual – and ATM usage will mirror a slow pace of change.
Sarah continues, ‘ATMs are a central element of the evolution moving more banking transactions to self-service, a movement that also includes online and mobile technology. Strategies for the branch network and the ATM network are often managed in concert. ATMs are responsible for removing some of the foot traffic from branches, but they can also be a key component for customer retention when a financial institution closes a branch office, replacing it with ATMs with enhanced services.’
Retail-based ATM Channel
Financial Institutions are turning toward ATMs to increase deposit rate amid closures in retail branch locations. According to Brad Nolan, EVP of Allpoint Solutions at Cardtronics, ATMs offer a channel to extend banking access to customers while pulling mundane high-cost transactions out of the branch. What banks need to leverage is what Nolan calls the “on-ATM” culture in reference to strong consumer demand for on-demand cash. Who wants to travel ‘all the way’ to the bank to get cash? FI’s can harness this “on-ATM” culture if they place ATM’s in convenient locations where their customers need cash: premium retail locations
But what about the digital channel? For FI’s concerned with digital demand, cardless ATMs, which allow consumers to withdraw cash on an ATM via a secure smartphone app, offer the ability to engage customers through the app instead of the wallet. Looking to solutions such as Allpoint+ that provide surcharge-free ATM’s in premium retail locations or Allpoint Mobile Cash, that harness the smartphone app for a mobile cash solution, FI’s have an option.
In an upcoming webinar titled “Leveraging Retail ATM Networks to Reshape Deposit Strategies” Brad Nolan, EVP for Allpoint Solutions at Cardtronics will join Sarah Grotta, Director of Debit and Alternative Products Advisory Service at Mercator Advisory Group to discuss retail-based, surcharge-free deposit ATMs as a channel for FI’s and the drivers for such a channel from the consumer and the FI point of view. The following topics will be covered in the webinar:
Join Us Thursday, Apr 25, 2019, 2:00 PM – 3:00 PM EST
- The place of cash in the payments economy
- Consumer drivers for cash
- Ways to empower cash access
- Benefits of cash access to issuers