JPMorgan Chase & Co. said Tuesday that it would deploy 900 image-scanning automated teller machines in the first half of next year that can accept up to 30 checks at a time without using an envelope.
The rollout is part of an effort to upgrade or replace 5,000 deposit-taking ATMs — more than half the New York company’s fleet — with envelope-free, multicheck machines by the end of the decade, JPMorgan Chase said.
The new ATMs, most of them made by Wincor Nixdorf International GmbH, can scan and print a receipt image of a check for consumers within 60 seconds — a technology that boosts consumer confidence in ATM deposits by providing an immediate transaction record, JPMorgan Chase said. Transaction volume increased 50% at some of the 50 locations where the new machines were tested in Indiana and Kentucky starting in 2002, the company said.
“A lot of people don’t feel comfortable making ATM deposits today. With these ATMs, they get an actual image of the check, and it counts the money for them, and they have a little piece of paper they can take away from the ATM that shows them exactly what their deposit is,” said Patrick Wright, the head of retail operations at JPMorgan Chase. “It’s significantly improved customer convenience. Customers also love it.”
The scanning technology also serves as a cost and time saver for JPMorgan Chase, because it can scan and process check images electronically instead of using a courier to unload and transport the checks for manual processing.
Mr. Wright said his company plans eventually to extend its daily check deposit deadline to as late as 10 p.m. or 11 p.m. “As the technology advances, we would like to take it even later.” (The daily deposit deadline is typically 5 p.m. or 6 p.m. at branches in major metropolitan areas but much earlier in some rural locations, he said.)
Bob Meara, a senior analyst at the Boston market research firm Celent LLC, said the arrival of no-envelope, bulk-load machines reflects an effort by banks to cut branch costs by driving more business to ATMs.
“Image ATMs have boosted per-ATM transaction numbers as well as changed the transactional mix to more significantly favor deposits instead of withdrawals,” he said. Using the machines to accept deposits will be “much less costly over the long run” than accepting them at traditional, staffed bank branches.
A study Celent published in August found that fewer than 20% of the largest U.S. banks use image-scanning ATMs, though more than 40% of those surveyed planned to upgrade to the technology.
JPMorgan Chase said it planned to deploy the multicheck ATMs at bank branches and kiosks across its 20-state area, but not at its network of off-premise cash dispensers in Duane Reade Inc. and Walgreen Co. stores.
Wincor Nixdorf, which is introducing bulk-load machines as a way to build share in the U.S. market, will provide the first 600 JPMorgan Chase ATMs, as well as updated software for the company’s entire fleet of 9,000 machines.
JPMorgan Chase also said it plans to install multicheck, no-envelope machines manufactured by its primary ATM provider, NCR Corp., but it did not say how many. It hopes to install 2,500 multicheck machines in all by the end of next year, Mr. Wright said.
Wells Fargo & Co. announced in January that it planned to deploy up to 1,200 multicheck scanning ATMs from Wincor Nixdorf.
