Technology - New ATMs

[Siji]

So I've got a bank issued check (ala nothing on the check is handwritten) that I need to deposit. No problem, I drive through the local ATM and start looking for the container with deposit envelopes in it. There isn't one. Then I notice that the ATM machine has a little sticker on there showing that it no longer uses envelopes for deposits. Ok, whatever.

So I put in my card, choose deposit, it asks me to insert the check and I do. Then it spits it out. I put it back in. It spits it out. The only indication that the ATM machine is giving me for it's refusal to take the check is some ghey little animation showing a hand smoothing out a crumpled check. I look at my check - it's pristine aside from a single fold in the middle, that's only been there for about 30 minutes. I then proceed to bend it around trying to make sure the crease isn't noticeable. I then go through the whole process of insert/spit/insert/spit again. Now, completely annoyed, I call up the customer support line where I'm told the best they can do is tell me where a non check-imaging ATM machine is. (What's going to happen when there aren't any?)

If this is the system that all banks are going to, they need to have a better fucking beta test process. If I can't use my banks ATM machines (I hate tellers, they're slow and they're annoying) then I have very little need of that specific bank. I mean seriously, who thought it would be a good idea to make it so that when there's a problem you have absolutely NO way of depositing money into your account. There's no backup option of the ATM not imaging the check, it either works or it doesn't. If it doesn't, fuck you come back another time.

I didn't try the cash depositing system but that was a separate spot on the ATM so I'm just going to assume it's just as fucking annoying.

Has anyone else come across these things?

[Winnow]

I don't normally use ATMs and it's even rarer that I have a physical check to deposit.

I happened to have a check and used one of those new ATMs. Worked great! I can't remember what the check was for but I'm pretty sure it was a business check. (not hand written)

[Zaelath]

The 3 times in the last 15 years that I have needed to deposit a cheque, the line inside the bank probably took up 30 minutes of my life in total.

It amused me when I was there to see how many people still used a cheque book in 2005, then they would pull out a perfectly good credit card for ID ...

I know this was a bank cheque, but in 2008 that's the only cheque I would accept.

[Aslanna]

Haven't seen those. But that's maybe because my bank (Bank of America) has no ATMs in my area. For that reason I also opened an account at a credit union so when I have a check I just go there. No muss no fuss.

[Ashur]

Which bank, Siji?

There's only a few players in the ATM industry and I'm in the group at our bank that has the development for the software that we deploy on the different vendor platforms. I know the whole "No Envelope" thing has been around for years though, as I was able to do that at my last bank before I started here about 6 years ago. I think you're dealing with a dirty scanner or something that just needs serviced it probably can't read the bar code on the check. I know they test the HELL out of any changes to ATMs, but (as any PC user knows) hardware can be flaky sometimes.

Like you I don't prefer to use a teller, and I love our bank's ATMs as you can set up a "quick choice", like take $20 out of checking account X and push a button for it instead of Enter after you type your PIN. Grats 30 seconds at the ATM!

BTW Siji, the backup to fucked up ATMs = Retail Branch Offices.

[Siji]

It was a Bank of America ATM. I rarely use ATMs and rarely ever carry cash anymore, but when I need to I need to. It's annoying as hell when "new & improved" technology prevents me from doing so.