I’ve used an ATM about a zillion times in my lifetime and have never gotten more or less money than it was suppose to give me. ATM’s must have the most reliable mechanisms for dispensing paper money in the world.
Has anyone ever NOT received the exact amount of money they expected from an ATM? What would you do if that happened? How could you prove to the bank that you were short changed?
Does anyone know why these things are so reliable?
Is there any reason why they couldn’t dispense other than 20’s? How about 10’s or 5’s?
Many Royal Bank (now RBC) machines in Canada give five-dollar and ten-dollar notes, and are marked as such. Sadly this seems to be less common now, which is a shame, because it’s a rather useful feature, especially if it’s the night before payday and you have $19.75 in your account and you want to get a hamburger at a place that doesn’t take debit cards…
I’ve seen a few machines from other banks that give twenties and fifties.
You report it to the bank ASAP. That moment if possible (call the number on the back of your card). You don’t prove it. They prove it by reviewing the records of the machine. If the balance of bills when they open it does not match the amount put in minus the amount distributed, that proves it.
Because their manufacturers have tremendous incentive to make them as error-free as possible.
As has already been noted, some do dispense other denominations.
I once had an ATM malfunction in the middle of a withdrawal; the failed transaction showed up in my balance immediately. I went into the bank and they took it off.
Because they have money in them. Constant maintenance pays for itself.
No reason; some ATMs do. But it’s not really economical because multiple denominations means more moving parts, more possibility of error, more frequent refilling, and less room for $20 bills.
There’s usually a phone by the machine for that - isn’t there?
Actually, once, the cash wasn’t quite dispensed for me (it was a large amount of cash, too, or for me it was large) and I had to dig around in the slot to get my money (instead of it poking out at me). However, once I’d done that, it was all there.
**
Before Bank of America took over my bank, it did dispense both $5s and $10s. Now, it dispenses 10s, sometimes - assuming they haven’t run out of those. (Sunday afternoon, a bad time to try and get 10s from an ATM). It also dispensed stamps which was incredibly convenient.
They are not 100% perfect. My friend recieved an extra $100.00 from a machine once. The withdrawl appeared for the normal amount (not including the extra 100) on his statement.
I did once. For some reason one of the bills did not come out all of the way. I could see it and touch it, but it was impossible to pull out. So actually, the ATM tried to give me the correct number of bills, but there was a malfunction.
I went into the bank and told a manager about it, but even though she could see the jammed bill, she couldn’t do anything about it. I had to call my credit union whose ATM card I was using and make a report to them. Kinda like disputing a credit card charge. The $20 was eventually credited to my account.
What KneadToKnow said. In my case one of the $20s was still stuck between the rollers of the dispenser, the other never made it that far. They balanced the machine and found it $40 over - exactly the amount I was shorted.
Has anyone ever NOT received the exact amount of money they expected from an ATM? What would you do if that happened? How could you prove to the bank that you were short changed?
I once tried to get out 50 dollars from an atm. I got 2 twenties and a 50.
Does anyone know why these things are so reliable?
No clue, thanks to computers not run by microsoft probably. I would guess they have a Unix mainframe that seems to be naturally resistant to MS based viruses in addition to being a trillion times more stable than anything MS ever put out.
Is there any reason why they couldn’t dispense other than 20’s? How about 10’s or 5’s?
I have gotten 5’s, 10’s, 20’s, and 50’s out of the ATM machine. I have never seen ones but I can’t imagine there is much need for it. I believe the reason they keep it generally as 20’s only (the cash machine in my building gives 10’s) is that it forces people to get more money out thus lowering the interest the account holder collects. Overall it wouldn’t be much but multiply that by millions of customers and it could add up. Banks are notoriously tightfisted.
Sounds like the person that filled the machine put a 50 into the 10 tray - not really an ATM error as such.
Do ATMs in the US only dispense $20 bills? Here in the UK they give you £10 and £20 notes - normally if you ask for £20 it will give you two £10 notes, then £30=£20+£10, £40=£20+£10+£10 etc. On my university campus the machine dispensed £5 notes – v handy for the impecunious – but that was a few years ago now and I doubt if it still does.
Incidentally, and I hope I won’t get into trouble for posting this, I heard that it is possible to get “free” money by withdrawing a large sum of money from an ATM (ie one that will produce a nice thick wad of notes), and while leaving the rest of them in the slot carefully withdrawing a few notes from the middle of the wad. After a while (say 30 seconds) the machine thinks you’ve forgotten about the money and withdraws it back inside, and cancels the transaction so no money is taken off your account.
Please note I have not tried this and neither do I endorse it! At any rate I can’t believe it does work – anyone know any more about this? Presumably, too, the bank could spot it by tallying up the amount of money left in the machine with the records.
I worked with a guy who used to program ATM machines and the networks on which they operate. From his tales these things are amazingly complicated. According to him the scanario where you put in your card and it just starts spitting out money has/does happen but it is exceedingly rare.
This may be a WAG, but I believe that ATM count the bills twice or more. First when they are removed from the stack of bills, and then again before they are dispensed. If you listen closely to the machine as it works, you’ll see why I say this.
The only problem I ever had with an ATM was when I received a few $20 bills that had clearly been covered with dye from a dye-pack. Worried that I would be accused of possessing/receiving stolen money, I showed each bill to the ATM camera. That way I figured I had a good alibi if someone called the cops on me.
I have not been to an ATM mach in at least 3 years. I use to use them often (before they all went fee crazy). Once I withdrew IIRC $60 maybe $80 and got 1 $10 instead of the $20’s that they normally gave out.
When I went into the bank to complain they told me that it was impossible and their machines only have $20’s in them. Then they relized that my grandfather was there too who had several 100,000's of 's in that bank at which time they promptly handed me my $10
Not at an ATM, but I had an auto tote machine at the race track screw me out of $20, and I think the company that makes auto tote also makes some of the ATMs. It took them 2 weeks to go through the money/computer to confirm I was right, and the machine was up by 20. And to make it worse, the machine hadn’t processed my bet, and the horse I wanted to bet on won at something like 22-1! I would have been up a good chunk for the day!:mad:
I think the OP meant they’re reliable in comparison with vending machines, elevators, card readers, public phones, parking meters, and other publicly-accessible machines driven by computers and moving parts. Not in comparison with PCs.
Listen to this one…I was at a Wawa ATM attemptimg to withdraw $50…I put in all the info and the gears inside started to make noise meaning I was about to get some cash. But at that very instant, the power in the store went out. I got no money and I was told I had to leave the store while the power was out. I told the lady what happened so I called back there an hour later and she said the power came back on but no money came out (yeah right) but the next day, my account showed $50 withdrawn. I filed a complaint with the bank and got my money back.
Here in Australia machines usually dispense $20’s and $50’s. You now get the odd machine that dispenses $100’s. I once received too little from a machine, went into the bank and told them. The teller was able to look on her computer and confirm the short payment instantly. They reset the ATM, and reversed the withdrawal. I then withdrew the correct amount. All up it took about 5 minutes.
It was a normal ATM transaction… i put in the card, punched in the code, entered the amount… the cash was dispensed… however, i somehow found something to do in this time (like fold all my previous receipts or some such) and hence did not remove the cash immediately… i think it must have been over 30 seconds that i hadn’t picked up the cash that was dispensed… just as i was about to pick up the cash, the cash vanished… initially i was stunned… but then i figured that maybe i overshot the time allowed to pick up the cash… this was confirmed by the message on the screen… i immediately went into the bank and reported the incident… they said that i need not worry, the amount will be credited back to my account the following day… so i made another transaction to get me some cash… first i made a balance enquiry… this balance print-out stated that i had withdrawn the previous amount (which i had not)… but the amount was credited back to me the following day…
this incident had led me to think of the scenario you mention… so i first asked a few of my friends who work in banking… they said that the returned cash is tallied with the amount dispensed and hence you cannot gain anything from such a transaction… anyway, i decided to test it… i made a withdrawal, and removed just a single note from the centre of the wad… and allowed the rest of the cash to be sucked back in by the machine… made a balance enquiry (which stated that i had withdrawn the entire amount)… checked my balance the following day (which stated that i had withdrawn just the single note)…
so, no, it won’t work… coz the amounts are tallied…
