CUSTOMER INTERFACE: SELF-SERVICE BANKING
Bringing ATMs in from the cold Mark Aldred, VP of International Sales at Auriga, and Robin Setty, Senior Principal Product Manager, Partner Solutions, at ACI Worldwide, tell us how they’re banking on a new lease of life for self-service In February this year, financial solutions providers Auriga and ACI Worldwide teamed up to launch an ATM acquiring and self-service banking platform. Yes, that’s ATM as in the automated teller machine technology that was pioneered in the UK in 1967. If you’ve been following the ATM’s recent fortunes through the prism of the UK experience, you might be surprised that anyone is putting it at the centre of its customer engagement strategy, given the rows over interchange fees, a sizeable contraction in the ATM estate (down nine per cent in 2020 alone, according to RBR) and, not least, an unprecedented decline in cash use forced by the pandemic. ATMs in the UK are often casualties of branch rationalisation – often a euphemism for closure – leading to cries of anguish among communities, particularly rural ones like South Fermanagh in Northern Ireland, which lost its Bank of Ireland counter and ATM in Lisnaskea in July. But, in many parts of the world, it’s a very different story. Elsewhere, ATMs and the interactive teller machine (ITM) that many ATMs have evolved into, are seen as solutions – not problems. ATMs-on-wheels have provided a lifeline to Indian communities that were isolated from www.fintechf.com
banks during the pandemic, and will likely continue to play a major part in native HDFC Bank’s customer relationship strategy beyond the crisis. In Portugal, as social distancing and disruption to normal routines continue, the country’s 11,000 terminals, which are part of the fabric of daily life, have become even more valued – you can do anything from make interbank transfers to pay your income tax and (when entertainment is back in full swing), even order opera tickets from them.
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Robin Mark Aldred, Setty, Auriga Auriga
But as banks’ branch networks morph into human teller-less advice centres and even combine into cost-saving, multi-brand community finance hubs, Auriga and ACI Worldwide are betting on ATMs and their derivatives featuring more strongly than ever in self-service banking estates. To do that, the back office technology that has historically seen ATMs operating in
a silo, divorced from other customer channels, needs to be addressed. That’s where Auriga and ACI’s platform comes in. By making the terminals part of a bank’s omnichannel network, they’re bringing ATMs in from the cold. Auriga provides solutions built on the principles of openness and multi-vendor software, which integrate a bank’s digital channels into a single environment, sharing services across them. It includes all of the components required to manage a self-service estate and ‘regenerate the branch of the next generation’. ACI Worldwide, meanwhile, provides real-time payment solutions for 6,000 customers across the globe, spanning the billers, merchants and banking sectors, including 19 of the leading 20 banks. It’s a partnership of complementary competencies, which sees ACI’s Enterprise Payments Platform – helping banks manage new payment types, standards and regulations – integrate with Auriga’s omnichannel banking solution, WinWebServer (WWS). “Together, ACI and Auriga can offer ATM deployers – banks or not – and owners of self-service and branch estates, a best-of-breed solution,” says Mark Aldred, VP of international sales at Auriga. Issue 21 | TheFintechMagazine
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