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Friday, Mar 29, 2024

Cardless ATM Makes Money Convenient

Bank of America Corp. has introduced cardless automated teller machines to the Los Angeles area as a response to customers looking for more ease in handling their finances. The Charlotte, N.C. bank plans to have 5,000 ATMs capable of doing transactions without a debit card in place by the end of the year. About 100 of the machines went active in the L.A. region, including 35 in the San Fernando Valley, at the end of May. Locations include 142 E. Olive Ave. in Burbank, 120 S. Brand Blvd. in San Fernando and 14701 Ventura Blvd. in Sherman Oaks. Other parts of the state, including San Francisco and Silicon Valley, also received the machines last month. Brian Jones, regional operations executive for Southern California at the bank, said these updated ATMs were made available because that is how customers want to do business. “If you think of connectivity of the internet to our physical world, customers are increasingly demanding that they take advantage of the technology to make their financial lives easier,” Jones said. Cardless technology has been available for several years. Other banks, including City National Bank, based in Los Angeles, began pilot programs for the cardless machines in 2013. Customers who want to use cardless ATMs first download a digital wallet to their mobile device and then input their Bank of America account information into the wallet. At the machine, the customer selects the B of A debit card from the digital wallet and then holds it over a special reader that activates the ATM. “They then follow the normal process of entering their (personal identification number) on the ATM,” Jones said. The majority of the ATMs that Bank of America has installed over the past few years already had the near field communication technology in it and only required a software upgrade. Customers will know they do not need a card from a symbol that is on the machine. “That is lit up in green,” Jones said. Doug Brown, senior vice president with FIS Mobile, a division of FIS, a Jacksonville, Fla. financial services technology company, said that banks are going with the cardless approach to stay relevant with customers. While millennials are the big driver of the service, FIS Mobile has seen good penetration across all-age demographics, Brown said. “We have some banks that have reported 79-year-old, 80-year-old users of cardless cash that have written in and are really excited about the security and the convenience,” he added. – Mark R. Madler

Mark Madler
Mark Madler
Mark R. Madler covers aviation & aerospace, manufacturing, technology, automotive & transportation, media & entertainment and the Antelope Valley. He joined the company in February 2006. Madler previously worked as a reporter for the Burbank Leader. Before that, he was a reporter for the City News Bureau of Chicago and several daily newspapers in the suburban Chicago area. He has a bachelor’s of science degree in journalism from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

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