Chicago-Area Bank Rolls Out Smartphone ATMs

Say goodbye to ATM cards and hello to your smartphone.

Rosemont-based Wintrust Financial started 2015 off with a technology statement, rolling out 190 “cardless cash” ATMs that allow customers to withdraw cash with their smartphones, the Chicago Tribune reported.

The machines will use software from FIS, a technology provider, to make the transactions possible.

According to the Tribune, customers can use their mobile app to set how much money they want to withdraw from an ATM. Once at the ATM, they sign into the app on their phone using a four-digit password, select the cardless cash option, which will open their camera and take a photo of a QR code on the ATM. Once they snap the photo, they then submit it to the app and the ATM will dispense their cash and send a receipt to their device.

In total, the process reportedly takes about 10 seconds to complete.

The new technology started for Wintrust customers at 29 machines, including one at the Madison Street branch in Chicago’s Loop, on Nov. 24 and is set to go live at all 190 ATMs by the end of February.

Experts tout the move as the future of banking. Mercator Advisory Group states in its “2015 Outlook: Banking Channels” report that they expect “increasing convergence of ATMS and mobile banking.”

BMO Harris Bank has also been testing the mobile cash technology with its employees and plans to begin using it with customers in the first quarter of 2015, the Tribune reports.
 

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