IMGCAP(1)]
State Bank of India, which has been buying thousands of ATMs, considers the machines key to acquiring and retaining customers. "ATMs are now a necessity for customer retention," Amitabh Kumar, general manager for the central bank's alternate channels and payment systems group, wrote in an e-mail message today to ATM&Debit News, a CardLine sister publication. "With lower transaction costs, it has become a preferred medium to expand customer touch points." State Bank, the country's largest bank based on assets, announced in 2007 it would expand its ATM network from 7,200 machines to 25,000 by the end of 2010, according to Dominic Hirsch, managing director of Retail Banking Research, a London-based strategic-marketing firm. Since then, the Mumbai-based bank has purchased ATMs primarily from NCR Corp., Diebold Inc., Wincor Nixdorf AG and Nautilus Hyosung Inc., says Kumar. State Bank's 10,000 to 15,000 ATMs deployed thus far serve more than 60 million customers, which do not include other banks' cardholders who also can access the machines, Kumar says. The bank is deploying ATMs throughout the country in every region and population group, he says. The bank also is deploying different types of ATMs. "We have a mix of both the standard model ATMs and cash dispensers," Kumar says. "ATMs with bar code readers have been deployed in metro and urban centers, and ATMs with biometric features have been deployed in rural and semi-urban areas."
