Page 46 - Banking Finance September 2020

ARTICLE

All Banks Sept 2019 Jan 2019 Jan 2018 Jan 2017 Jan 2012 an ATM making it an unviable business.
They have also warned that half of the
ATM (Nos.) 2,06,589 2,03,458 2,06,739 2,06,609 88,838
ATM machines in the Country might
Debit Card 83.56 92.34 84.67 77.86 26.80 face closure in near future if some
(Nos. in Cr.) corrective measures are not taken.
Debit Cards 79.40 88.05 74.16 71.23 43.41
(No. of Transactions In the light of above circumstances;
in ATM)(nos. in Cr) ATM industry is going to face
tremendous challenge in near future.
Debit Cards 2,73,786 2,66,124 2,55,022 1,51,644 1,20,981
(Amount of
transactions in ATM) Challenges and Threats
(Rs. In Cr) X RBI Guidelines-Regulatory and
(Source: RBI) compliance issues play a key role in
business and technology strategies
of financial institutions, as the end
The above data shows that there was a time when ATMs were opened day in
goal of the compliance regulations
day out by all the banks, from 2012 to 2017 there was more than 100% increase
in no. of ATMs installed as well as no. of ATM card issued and no. of debit card is to manage and mitigate risks
since security at the ATM has
transactions. But after demonetisation in the last quarter of 2016, increase in
become one of the major
the no. of ATM has come to a halt and in last two years it is on declining trend.
challenges as the threats are
becoming more diverse in nature
All Banks Sept Sept Sept Sept Sept
than ever before. To mitigate risk
2019 2018 2017 2016 2015
in ATMs RBI came with following
POS Txns. (Nos. in Cr.) 59.44 50.09 37.90 20.31 15.23 notifications-
Mobile Banking Txns. 110.76 48.96 11.39 7.26 2.71 1. Cassette - Swaps in ATMs-To
(Nos. in Cr.) mitigate risks involved in open
cash replenishment/ top-up, it
(Source: RBI)
is advised that banks may
consider using lockable
While the growth of ATM has come to a standstill at present, POS and Mobile
cassettes in their ATMs. This
Banking transactions have been registering huge growth. The trend shows that
people are showing more interest in digital transaction. may be enforced in a phased
manner covering at least one
third ATMs operated by the
High maintenance cost-Interchange fee is the fee that banks pay each other for
the use of their ATMs by other banks' customers. This is currently fixed at Rs. 15 banks each year, such that all
ATMs achieve cassette swap
per cash transaction and Rs. 5 for a non-cash transaction and has not been revised
by March 31, 2021.
since 2012. The cost of transaction on ATM works out to be Rs 23 for a 150 hits/
day ATM. 2. Control measures for ATMs-
a. Implement security
After recent RBI guidelines on ATMs, maintenance and transactions on channels measures such as BIOS
will become costlier. RBI has advised that banks may consider using lockable password, disabling USB
cassettes in their ATMs. Also, banks have to upgrade all the ATMs with supported ports, disabling auto-run
versions of operating system and to implement anti-skimming and whitelisting facility, applying the latest
solution. These guidelines will demand a sizeable investment that may account patches of operating
for up to 40% of the cost of ATM machine. system and other
software, terminal
The Confederation of ATM Industry (CATMi) said that new rules issued by the security solution, time-
government and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) would hike the cost of running based admin access, etc.

46 | 2020 | SEPTEMBER | BANKING FINANCE