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Thursday July 08, 04:29
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UK Bank Customers Asked To Reduce ATM Usage
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A major UK bank, First Direct, is seeking to cut card fraud by asking customers to use ATMs as little as possible, just a week after APACS reported Britons to lead Europe in terms of ATM usage. The UK is the fastest-growing market in western Europe for cash machines, which supplied over half (53 per cent) of all cash to individuals, at over Stg 144 billion in 2003, or an average of 75 withdrawals per second. At bank or building society ATMs, average cash withdrawals totaled Stg 61, versus Stg 46 at non-financial-owned machines, but total ATM fraud for 2003 rose to Stg 39 million, which was a factor in First Direct’s warning.
First Direct’s most frequent ATM-using customers are instead being advised to use retailers’ cashback at the POS facilities, or to use their debit cards for more purchases. The bank emphasized that fraud prevention and not cost-cutting was the motive for a mail-shot to over 110,000 customers, who were reminded that ATM withdrawals of up to Stg 500 at a time are possible. Given the greater risk of mugging if larger ATM withdrawals are made, police are not in favor of this approach, but despite the risk of fraud, the UK installed 5,636 new ATMs in 2003, raising the total base by 13.8 per cent to 46,461.
In the UK, over Stg 1 million in bankcard fraud is committed daily, with a bogus transaction taking place every 8 seconds, according to APACS. Of the 158 million ATM-enabled plastic cards used in the UK in 2003, 70.4 million were credit or charge cards, 62.9 million were debit cards and 24.9 million were ATM-only cards. APACS also reports UK consumers to have made 2.37 billion ATM withdrawals in 2003, with cash also obtained by cashing checks, over-the-counter transactions at banks and building societies, cash advances on credit cards and using cash-back facilities at retailers’ POS terminals.
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