Many financial institutions are looking to shift a number of transactions that were previously performed by tellers to self-service ATMs and kiosks as they strive to find ways to increase customer engagement while reducing costs.

Advancements in technology now make it possible for today’s modern ATMs to handle a wide variety of transactions as well as offer a wide variety of functions such as cardless, cash recycling, digital wallet pay-outs, and even third-party product promotions.

While it might be “nice” to implement every feature and function at each ATM location, there is a cost associated with this that must be assessed and weighed. Generally, the more features and functions that are enabled, the greater the hardware and software licensing costs.

How do you determine the right mix of features and services for your user base? Like any good plan, the answer is found through research and analytics. The best analytics in this case come from real- time monitoring of your current ATM fleet.

To take full advantage of the insights gleaned from analyzing the real-time data from your fleet, you need a fleet management system that not only allows you to capture the data, but that allows you to quickly make and send updates to your fleet with drag & drop screen changes and remote commanding. And of course, a system that supports in-demand features like contactless, P2P, bill payments and even targeted offers at the ATM.

When managed properly and designed for optimized customer experiences, ATMs have enormous potential and the capability to provide personalized, timely and engaging interactions. Euronet’s Ren Self-Service provides the comprehensive tools organization’s need for real-time ATM fleet monitoring and efficient remote management.

With all the talk about the “death of cash” it may surprise you to learn that more account holders use the ATM than any other banking channel.¹ In fact, according to a study by J.D. Power, over half of consumers used an ATM or drive-thru to get cash in 2020.² While the number of ATM transactions has declined over the past two years, the dollar amount of ATM withdrawals has grown, as has the frequency of cash deposits. This is because a significant portion of consumers still rely heavily on cash for day-to-day expenses. This is especially true for consumers in rural areas and those in lower income urban neighborhoods. It is also true of GenZ. GenZers prefer to use cash for in-person payments almost as much as they use P2P options like Venmo, and Cash App.³ Mobile payments and debit cards come second and third to physical currency as a preferred way to pay for this demographic group.⁴

In many cases, these vulnerable groups have seen the highest number of branch closures in their neighborhoods which frequently results in fewer ATMs and have been disproportionately affected by a lack of access to cash.

In support of consumers, there appears to be a grass-roots movement to protect cash as a payment instrument. Around the globe, various governments and industry groups are taking actions to preserve cash as payment instrument. The UK recently announced the new Financial Services and Markets Bill, which will ensure the continued availability of withdrawal and deposit facilities across the UK. Cash remains an important payment method for millions across the UK, particularly those in vulnerable groups, and the government’s action shows a commitment to preserving consumers access to it.⁵ The ATM Industry Association (ATMIA) is calling for universal cash deposit standards and processes. The European Central Bank (ECB) recently outlined its 2030 cash strategy to ensure that banknotes remain widely available and accepted as a competitive payment instrument that can be owned and used by all consumers in the European Union. In the U.S. there is currently no federal law that requires businesses to accept cash, but more than half of all states have passed legislation that outlaws the discrimination of cash buyers by preventing businesses from requiring credit payment.⁶ Just last month, the U.S. Congress passed the Payment Choice Act, intended to ensure continued acceptance of cash as a payment option for consumers throughout our nation. The bill requires all brick-and-mortar retail businesses to continue allowing consumers to pay with cash for purchases of goods and services up to $2,000. The bill still must pass in the U.S. Senate to become law.⁷

It’s good for the customer experience

These factors are important considerations for financial institutions as they work to implement services that meet the needs of these communities in the most efficient way possible. By adding cash recycling to a portion of a bank’s ATM fleet financial institutions can provide the needed services while realizing multiple benefits such as reducing ATM operating costs, facilitating multi-denomination capabilities, reducing customer wait times (by migrating transactions such as cash deposits from tellers to the ATM), and freeing up bank staff to perform other relationship building functions.

As branch closures expand, ATMs with cash recycling capabilities and 24/7 availability can play a vital role in providing continued services for small to medium merchant accounts who handle a large volume of cash payments. In the absence of a nearby open branch, an ATM with cash recycling capabilities can allow these valued accounts to make cash deposits when it is most convenient for the merchant regardless of branch hours. These businesses also appreciate that there’s no delay in crediting their accounts for deposits made at recycling ATMs. Making it easy and cost effective for merchants to deposit cash regularly can also serve to encourage merchants to continue to accept cash payments at their business.

It’s good for increasing efficiency and reducing CIT costs

When it comes to ATM fleet management and costs, CIT services are often the greatest expense that banks incur. Maximizing efficiency is crucial to optimize operating costs in today’s environment. By implementing cash recycling, the frequency of CIT visits can be significantly reduced resulting in a substantial savings for CIT fees. Additionally, automated cash recycling is less likely to induce loading errors that can occur with manual CIT cash loads, reducing downtime. With proper cash withdrawal/deposit analysis and planning, cash recycling can help to ensure plentiful cash levels at the ATM– reducing the incidence of out-of-service events while avoiding replenishing low volume locations too frequently and serve to improve overall customer satisfaction with the self-service channel.

It’s good for the environment

An added benefit of cash recycling ATMs is that it is a greener, more sustainable business practice. Recycling ATMs can increase financial inclusion by ensuring cash and other banking services are easily accessible in areas with few or no bank branches. And reducing the number of CIT visits and potentially reducing the number of service calls can mean lower carbon emissions directly related to ATM fleet operations. Overall, it’s a win-win-win for financial institutions, customers, and the environment.

Long Live Cash and the ATM!

We believe the rumors of the death of cash have been exaggerated. As branch closures continue to accelerate, ATMs can fill the financial services void these closures create, ensuring communities have access to cash as well as a host of other vital products and services, at a cost much lower than the cost of a traditional branch location.

​Interactive Teller Machines (ITMs) are gaining popularity in the United States, and many banks are considering adopting these highly functional devices. ITMs go beyond cash withdrawals, check and cash deposits, account transfers, and bill payments, offering services like account opening, loan applications, and financial advice. With an ITM, your customers can experience live interaction with a video teller who may provide additional information and assist with transactions.

ITMs reduce the need for typical branch resources and offer bank services to underserved communities unable to support a physical branch bank. They provide considerable savings in both real estate costs and payroll. In addition, they may attract customers who wish to conduct their banking business outside office hours.

However, many banking institutions are skeptical about deploying ITMs. Concerns include:

• Hardware expense – multiple times the cost of an ATM
• Specialized software and equipment
• Strong bandwidth is important for efficient communication
• Expanded Call Center
• Extend Call Center hours
• Possibly upgrades to the infrastructure
• Terminal maintenance with specialized technicians

Importantly, customers may not like the new technology and underuse it.

So, how does a Financial Institution decide whether to proceed with ITMs? One factor affecting the decision is the geography of the bank. In some countries, the public is happy to interact electronically, while in others, customers want face-to-face interaction. Further, the telecommunications network is more suitable in some countries than others. It will be a waste of investment capital to install ITMs in rural areas if poor broadband creates a negative customer experience.

Banks should have a clear strategy for how they would like to serve their customers. Using a traditional branch mode? Digitally through internet and mobile apps? Or is it a more omnichannel approach? If the bank pursues one of the first two options, an ITM will not contribute to the overall strategy of the bank. But, if the bank wishes to present an omnichannel profile, ITMs could be the way to go.

Sometimes, an incremental approach to full self-service terminals can provide insight into their suitability for your bank’s client portfolio. Before investing in new hardware, software, or expanding a call center, leverage your existing ATM network to show customers the myriad of transaction possibilities on conventional ATMs. If clients embrace these transactions at the ATM, they may be ready to accept account services via a video banker through ITMs.

With a rise in real-time payments (RTP) worldwide, banks and solution providers are rushing to fill out their offerings of digital overlay services. Digital overlay services are value-added services that utilize the rails of an RTP network to enable and showcase the value of a real-time transaction.

We’ve seen this before, back in the 19th century, as the United States committed to building a nationwide network of railroads. As the railroad system developed and stretched across the country, the US economy followed, leveraging those new rails to expand businesses. Boomtowns from east to west popped up seemingly overnight. Beyond the people and goods that railroads carried, the rails themselves were the catalyst that created new cities, millions of jobs, and countless “value-added” services these new towns needed to thrive.

We’re experiencing a modern-day equivalent in real-time payments around the world. As one of the most groundbreaking advancements in recent financial history, RTP has quickly become the hottest topic in our industry. In a real-time payments network, money is sent from one party to another via rails set up to complete that transaction in seconds. A country or region must first establish those rails via a real-time payment clearinghouse. This clearinghouse acts as the train station, sending and receiving transactions across the network and intelligently managing the traffic to stay within the tight time requirements.

Much like early railroad lines, consumers and businesses alike chase the value that these new real-time payment rails enable. The rails facilitate the transaction, but you need a digital overlay service to kick off the entire process. Request-to-pay is a common service that overlays onto a real-time payment rail, allowing a payee to request a payment from a payer. Historically, this has largely been a consumer-led service, but now businesses see the value and have quickly jumped on board. Request-to-pay is just one example of how digital overlay services create value and demand for real-time transactions.

The value of digital overlay services is two-fold. From the consumer and business side, digital overlay services bring convenience and immediate cash flow. From the bank side, digital overlay services create new revenue channels and a level of stickiness with their customers that all financial institutions desperately need right now.

REN Connect GO is our suite of Global Overlays that can help you and your customers quickly realize the value of real-time payment rails. For more information, please visit our website.

In SE Asia, cash is still the predominant form of payment. Being from the U.S. and going from paying for my coffee with cards or my smartphone to paying with cash required a mindset change. But that’s where I found myself as the pandemic exploded last year.

I wanted to use my card and phone to make contactless payments, but the acceptance rates were low. But, when covid-19 hit, I was among the local consumers afraid of encountering the virus. So we would sanitize everything we touched – all surfaces, doorknobs, elevator buttons, food, drink items, and even cash.

It has been about a year since the pandemic broke out globally, and it has caused a ripple effect on practically all aspects of our lives – from what we wear, what we eat, how we work, and how we transact with one another. Some developments have been sudden and involuntary, such as social distancing, wearing masks, limiting public transportation, and restrictions on travel. For others, it has merely accelerated the adoption of behaviors already gaining traction, such as digitization of shopping, banking, and more. Thus, the “new normal” has become a fact of everyday life.

When countries went under lockdown, we had to get used to spending a lot of time at home. As a result, working from home became the norm, and online shopping became more necessary than a luxury. However, the thought of going out for groceries or essential items brought concerns and risks of catching the virus from someone. Plus, the hassle of sanitizing oneself upon returning home is exhausting. Besides, online shopping gives consumers a choice and the ability to price compare, while the payment is secure and convenient using debit or credit cards. And there is also an option of transferring funds from bank accounts to the online shopping platform’s e-wallet. Therefore, it’s not surprising that Covid-19 has led to a surge in e-commerce and accelerated digital transformation. In fact, as far back as March 2020, contactless increased 150% compared to March 2019.

Online banking also took on more importance as consumers experiment with performing more self-service banking transactions themselves, so it is no surprise that mobile bank registrations were up 200% and traffic 85% by April 2020. Self-registering for online banking access to existing accounts, opening new current, savings, and time deposit accounts without going into the bank branch, then funding those newly opened accounts by easily transferring funds from another bank have made banking easier and faster. Even sending money domestically and internationally became painless.

After the lockdown, I always made it a point to pay using my phone or my contactless card every time I went out for groceries or essential items. In 2021, the acceptance rates of digital forms of payment have improved greatly, and no merchant has declined me! I guess it’s not surprising as the trend for contactless payments has taken off in the past year.

The experience of living through Covid-19 is changing the world in which we live and our behavior. Changes that provide positive experiences are likely to last longer, particularly those driven by convenience and well-being, such as digital adoption, value-based purchasing, and increased health awareness.

More than a year has passed since the COVID-19 pandemic became part of our lives, and our “new normal” started taking shape. Changes in our social behavior led to changes in the ways we do business. We increasingly avoided physical retail stores, opted for online shopping, and converted to digital forms of payment. Consequently, the use of cash decreased significantly.

Vaccines are once again shifting the new normal, and while some recently adopted behavior will remain, there is also a return to our former lives, including the use of cash for payments. Consider:

• Consumers who were avoiding cash due to hygiene considerations are comfortable handling cash after vaccination.
• Cash is considered by many a shelter in times of crisis.
• A considerable consumer segment—the unbanked and underbanked—continue to use cash as their primary payment method.
• The post-Covid era seems to be one of less cash, rather than cash-less.

How will the ATM participate in this new financial landscape? What will be the primary purpose of ATMs in the future, and how can financial institutions adapt to ensure they are running a profitable ATM fleet?

Evolution is the key to future-proofing the ATM. Even before the pandemic began, the ATM channel had started to play an expanded role, with services such as bill payments and mobile top-ups part of the offering. Now, with self-service being the preferred method of banking, it is time to extend the role of this powerful self-service channel even further—to become a digital payments and transaction hub. This transition will produce new functionality and new revenue streams that can compensate for the diminished frequency of cash withdrawals and turn the ATM channel into a revenue generator. Below are a few adaptations for your consideration:

• Cash-in transactions are gaining popularity. As the underbanked population with cash in their pockets seeks to participate in digital payments, the self-service terminal offers a way to deposit cash into prepaid wallets that may be used for online purchases or pay bills electronically.
• Consumers make purchases at the ATM. Consumers can buy tickets for events, local attractions, or public transportation, digital content cards, insurance, stamps, and prepaid cards—either plastic or virtual.
• Card-less transactions allow P2P cash payments to any beneficiary.
• Automated check deposits enhance customer service.
• Charity donations provide a simple and convenient way to support community service organizations.
• Services to travelers in airports, seaports, and train and bus terminals may include dispensing of foreign currencies or dynamic currency conversion.
• ATMs may act as a cash reward dispensing point for customer loyalty programs, B2C bonuses or incentives, or even lottery payouts.
• Advertising on ATM screens and receipts can provide additional income.
• Marketing Campaigns offer cross-selling opportunities to new and existing clients.
• Kiosk-type account services can reduce banking operating costs.
• Cash Recycling and Remote Key Loading can greatly reduce ATM maintenance expenses.
• While not a new revenue stream on their own, contactless, or less-contact transactions contribute to returning trust in the safety of ATMs.

As ATMs transform into digital payment hubs, they will gain an expanded significance for financial institutions and consumers, despite the declining demand for cash.

More than ever, your customers demand fast, convenient, and digital payments. Far beyond pizza delivery, consumers ordered everything from exercise equipment to cat litter to theatre tickets online – delivered straight to your door or email inbox. Classes from kindergarten through University are streamed live. Food delivery services, groceries ordered online and picked up in the parking lot—streaming movies – any movie – viewed on any number of platforms. Consumers not only expect but now presume convenience.

The slightest stumble in this instant gratification marketplace can disrupt the ideal customer experience – wait, you’re saying I have to get out of bed to find a physical credit card to complete this transaction?

Fintechs have held the edge over banks and traditional brick and mortar retailers in meeting consumer demand for convenient and fast payments. But taking an omnichannel approach to payments will allow merchants and banks to compete.

With the help of national fast payment networks, banks can compete today. However, connecting to a real-time payments network is often fraught with complexity. Does your bank have the knowledge, the skills, and the budget to connect your system to the network, all while minimizing modernization and security risks?

The most challenging aspects of connecting to an RTP are integrating with legacy systems while managing costs. On the surface, the seemingly best investment is to keep the process in-house – you already have people and technology resources, so why not leverage them to build the connectivity you need? But the obstacles with migrating to these new platforms include cross-border capabilities, retaining current card networks and payment rails, meeting regulatory compliance, integrating fraud detection, all while considering the possibility of cloud-based solutions. Are you ready to meet those tasks?

Working with a partner with Euronet’s experience and know-how and our REN Connect solution makes it easy for your bank to join an RTP network and gain all the advantages in participating in these faster payment networks.

REN Connect is dedicated to connecting participant financial institutions to your country’s real-time payments network. Available as on-premises software or in the cloud, REN Connect enables your users, like business analysts to software developers, to connect your back-office systems to a real-time network through a visual drag-and-drop interface or industry-standard XSLT code.

REN Connect specializes in transforming message types (ISO8583 to ISO20022, for example) and can be extended easily in the future to accommodate any new message types. The solution also provides access to Euronet’s REN Foundation – digital overlay services you can leverage to build products for customers that utilize your new connection to the real-time payments network.

In a recent press release, Euronet Worldwide, a global financial technology solutions and payments provider, announced that the placement of AMBER Alerts on its ATM screens in several European countries had resulted in hundreds of phone calls and the successful location of eight missing persons during 2020. AMBER Alerts are emergency messages issued when a law enforcement agency determines that a child has been abducted and is in imminent danger. AMBER Alerts inform communities to assist in the search for and safe recovery of an abducted child.

Euronet initiated this community service on their ATMs in the Netherlands in 2019, and quickly expanded to four other European countries. Given the success, Euronet expects to broaden the service to its ATMs in other European countries in the coming months.

One reason we can provide this important service is the ATM Channel Manager software that Euronet has developed and deployed on its ATMs”, said Tony Warren, Managing Director – Euronet USA. “Because the ACM Client eliminates the dependency on states and screens, it allows dynamic content to be remotely deployed to ATMs easily. With ACM, content updates such as these alerts and even targeted advertising can be handled by marketing staff without IT involvement. To increase the value and effectiveness of content ACM enables it to be customized by ATM location, ATM User or even time of day, making it possible to deliver timely and relevant information to both ATM users as well as passersby.”

Euronet’s ATM screens, viewed by millions of users and passersby each day serve not only the community’s financial needs, but also provide important public service announcements such as these AMBER Alerts and notifications for area events. And since ACM supports both video and still imagery, the information can be shared in a variety of formats.

ATM Channel Manager Client Solution (ACM Client) is a multi-vendor, multi-function ATM driving software for financial institutions and ISOs looking to modernize customer experience and fleet operations with a rich transaction set and state-of-the art tools for comprehensive real-time fleet management.

Renowned business author Ken Blanchard noted the importance of collaboration in “The One Minute Manager.” That quote speaks volumes for banks interested in joining a real-time payment network. As the trend of real-time payments has swept over the world, it has repeatedly shown success, and with success comes another surge in participation. Everyone from banks to fintechs to merchants are looking to capitalize on the potential revenue from being part of a real-time payment network. The dilemma for those looking to join a network is where to start. Like most trends that hit the payments industry, there is a large learning curve, particularly for the development teams required to connect the bank to the RTP network.

Here’s where we return to Ken Blanchard’s quote: banks won’t know everything they need to know as they start this process, and that’s okay–there are experienced companies that can help. It’s in a banks best interest to find a partner to help guide them through the process, gaining speed to market and education along the way.

Euronet recently partnered with Forrester on research with 325 payments executives worldwide, half that had already joined an RTP network, and half that are planning to join one soon. Three points were abundantly clear after the study:

• Banks want to participate in an RTP network.
• Banks feel unprepared.
• Banks that enlisted a payments solution provider to help were happier than those that did not.

Following the momentum of real-time payments around the world, eighty percent (80%) of the executives listed “Faster Payments” as their customers’ current top expectation. This finding was no surprise as real-time payments were the hottest trend in payments before the global pandemic. Since the pandemic started, contactless payment options have become a requirement to ensure safety while conducting business. The need for contactless has created a sense of urgency by consumers, even in countries where there isn’t a formalized RTP network.

As a result, banks that might have been hesitant to adopt RTP must get on board. The same is true for countries without an RTP network in place. The past year has sparked immense interest in RTP as a contactless payment option and plans for new networks are quickly spreading.

While most executives know their customers are demanding real-time payments, many existing RTP networks are waiting for banks and merchants to join. According to the study, many executives attribute the slow adoption to three things:

• Integration to an RTP network is too difficult.
• Banks are currently short-staffed.
• Lack the necessary skills to develop the RTP connection.

The good news is that all three of these primary concerns can be remedied through a partnership with a payment solution provider. Creating the connection to an RTP network can be difficult. Most banks have a legacy payments solution in place, and these typically use ISO 8583. Nearly all the RTP networks utilize ISO 20022, and this can be a non-starter for a bank with little to no experience in that message type. For a bank to properly integrate a legacy solution to a modern RTP network, there must be a translation layer to handle the two message types used on either side of the transaction. Using a ready-made offering from a partner that sits between the bank and RTP clearinghouse can seamlessly route and translate RTP transactions, reducing the bank’s legacy system burden.

Another benefit of partnering is that the expertise found at a payment solution provider can make up for the bank’s staff’s experience and staffing gaps. Having a partner with experience in building complex payments solutions, specifically for participation in an RTP network, can greatly reduce time to market.

In an industry that is becoming increasingly “digital-first,” the ability to offer real-time payment solutions is crucial in establishing market share. Our independently commissioned research showed that bank executives that outsourced the development of their RTP connection were more satisfied with the experience than those who chose to devise their own RTP connection.

If you have found yourself struggling with connecting to an RTP network or are just getting started and are looking for a partner to minimize risk and greatly speed up your time to market, please consider Euronet and our latest offering, REN Connect. Just remember, none of us is smarter than all of us. Let us work with you to develop the connection that best meets your needs, today and tomorrow.

As we start reopening of the economy, what might the world look like for the payments industry? In this link, Accenture shares 10 ways COVID-19 is impacting payments (May 5, 2020). It’s likely that the first two impacts mentioned – that the largest economies will stumble hardest, and that consumer spending will be in retreat – will be short term consequences of the pandemic. Of course, the short term is relative in this environment. Is the short term for three months or two years? According to a New York Times poll released May 20, only one in five Americans expect business conditions to be “very” or “somewhat” good in the next year. And yet we are seeing some positive signs, not the least of which is a global network of scientists and pharma working toward a vaccine as early as 2021 or even sooner.

As Accenture points out, there will be a rise in digital wallet usage. Merchants and consumers were already embracing digital payments, but the pandemic has spurred this segment to greater growth and acceptance. With a greater demand for fast, easy, and safe payments, we agree that consumers and merchants will more quickly embrace digital wallets and embedded payment methods. This growth of digital payments will also lead to a greater need for fraud protection and banks must be prepared to deliver multilevel authentication.

Digital payments growth will come at the expense of cash. But don’t bury cash just yet. Roughly 30% of U.S. transactions, 40% of E.U. transactions, and over 80% of India’s transactions are still cash-based. Consumers want options – an omni-channel approach to payment methods – not restrictions.

The Accenture article also points to the consumers’ need to manage cashflows more tightly during these uncertain financial times and thus having a desire to control their finances. The ’08 recession combined with the simultaneous adoption of the smartphone had already given consumers the technology necessary to control their finances. Once again, the pandemic is simply speeding up this adoption. Banks and merchants will need to deliver the customized experience consumers have come to expect online.

This delivery of technology and innovation is at odds with another Accenture impact: that payments firms will shift short term priorities from investing in innovation to cost reduction. On this point, we can’t state strongly enough that banks must continue to innovate, or their own recovery will be in jeopardy. There are solutions that meet the needs of both innovation and lower total cost of ownership. Our REN Foundation is purpose-built and future-proofed, offering advantages for our clients such as:

• Lower Total Cost of Ownership. Ease maintenance concerns and pursue new opportunities with microservices architecture.
• Adaptive Routing. Securely route any type or size of data between different applications and systems.
• OS and Database Agnostic. Eliminate incompatibility. Operate with existing hardware, OS, and databases.
• Infinite Messaging. Process QR codes, fingerprints, graphics, or any type of data in singular transactions.
• Linear Scalability. Operate within a small footprint in your data center and scale-up on commodity hardware.
• 100% Availability. Make changes and update without taking the system down or the need for idle redundant servers.