ATM being Automated Teller Machine.
I was watching a rerun of Mama’s Family where Mama get’s ripped off by the ATM at her bank. So she starts wailing on the ATM and it spits out $800.00
I have never been ripped off by one and I try to use them as much as possible. Of course I’ve never gotten any extra money either.
They’ve always been spot on for me.
And you?
I get ripped off all the time. If I use an ATM not owned by my bank, the ATM charges a fee and my bank charges a separate fee. I took out 20 bucks the other day and paid a $4 surcharge.
In the case of Superhal, I’d wonder if he’s given notification of the transaction fee and the opportunity to decline the transaction? That’s how that works with every machine I’ve ever encountered. My own bank’s ATM’s don’t charge a fee for me to get money from my accounts, but many other bank’s ATM’s do. There’s always a notice on the machine to the effect of “There will be a transaction fee of (however much that bank charges); would you like to continue with the transaction?”
In Superhal’s case, where the fee was high and the amount withdrawn was fairly small, I’d have discontinued the transaction, and gone to a convenience store or supermarket, bought a pack of gum or mints, paid with my debit card, and asked for cash back.
As for the question in the OP, I have experienced neither, but my Mom did once. She went to the ATM to withdraw $100.00. At that time, ATM’s often gave you a choice of currencies. Mom asked for it all in $10.00 bills; the ATM spit out ten $20.00 bills, the receipt showed she had only withdrawn $100.00.
She was honest enough to go into the bank lobby the following day and tell them what had transpired. The cashier sniffingly informed her that their ATM ‘made no such errors’ and sent Mom on her way, $100.00 to the good. On her next statement, not only was the extra $100.00 removed (which she probably would have been fine with), but there was some sort of overdraft or somesuch fee involved. Mom sunk her heels in, and fought at least the fee. In the end, the fee and the extra money was re-instated into her account!
Once I got a $10 bill instead of a $20. When I went into the bank I was told that the machine only has $20’s and it was impossible. But at the same time my grandfather was opening a very large account at their bank, once they realized that I was his grandson they refunded my $10.
About 25 years ago (I was a teenager) I wanted to close a bank account. Not knowing any better, I decided to try doing it at the ATM in front of the bank. Was quite surprised when I was able to withdraw $100, despite my account only having about $20 in it. Went home, and received a call later that day from the bank, asking for their money back; apparently (duh) the ATM had experienced some sort of malfunction.
A friend once had an ATM short him a $20 bill. He immediately informed the bank; they counted up the cash remaining in the machine, determined it was $20 over, and handed him $20.
I got an extra $20 bill once. It was stuck to another $20 bill. (I actually had to pry them apart.) I was broke, in college, and had no morals at the time, so I kept it without telling anyone.
I was shorted twenty bucks when using an ATM on a Sunday. I kept my receipt, called the bank the next day, faxed them the receipt, and got my $20 back right away. I expected a much bigger hassle, but everyone was very pleasant and reasonable.
Yes, many years ago I got a windfall.
What happened was this: I went to an ATM to get out some cash late one night. It was the only machine for a long, long way. I put my card in and the machine made a grinding noise but didn’t spit out any cash.
I was sort of cursing and wondering WTF to do, when another dude came to the machine. I warned him about my experience, but he was desperate for money so he decided to experiment: he tried taking out $20.
Again the machine made a grinding sound; again, no cash … but we could see the corner of a crumpled wad of bills poking through the slot. A bit of working at it with a pencil, and we managed to extract a thick wad of bills; there was something like $800.
What to do? Well, it was late at night, there was no obvious way to return it, and so we - split it and went our ways.
Given the probably thousands of times I’ve used ATM’s, I’d have to say they are remarkably accurate. Once, several years ago, I got a $10 bill mixed in with the $20’s. I went straight to the desk and showed the teller the bills and my receipt, and she handed me $10 without further question.
I like to think that keeping a customer happy outweighed the slim possibility that I was trying to scam ten bucks out of them. That kind of attitude is probably gone from banking these days.
I used a BOA ATM in the Bahamas and tried for $200 but it gave me a receipt deducting $200 but no money at all. None. When the bank opened the next day I was told they can’t give me the $200 or fix my account, I have to do it when I get back to the states. What?? Apparently they have a rule that only your Primary bank can ever fix anything for you, and obviously my primary account was not in the Bahamas. My pleas of,“But YOUR bank caused the problem!”; did not help at all.
I got the money back but it took nearly 5 weeks and several phone calls and 1 visit to the bank to talk to the manager.
You know they have cameras in those things? I’m kind of surprised you didn’t get found out.
Not that I’m judging – I can’t guarantee I wouldn’t have done the same thing.
It would certainly have been possible to check the account data against the time of the withdrawal. But the amount was so low I doubt it would have been worth it; and in point of fact, nothing happened.
Also, what reason would the bank have to check? They were probably not out any money - what I assume happened, is that all of the last few customers’ cash ‘backed up’ in the machine through some glitch. Only if those customers made a complaint would there have been any issue raised; and even if any did, that would probably take some time to work through the system and for someone to wonder what happened to the missing cash. Most likey they just sent a technician to fix the machine.
I had a $60 windfall once. The machine gave me three twenties beyond my request, and the receipt was for the correct amount. Score!
…however at some point during the next week $60 was removed from my account with a notation like “ATM error adjustment” or some such. I have often wondered if there’s another counting mechanism that isn’t tied to the user interface, or if someone actually reviewed the video looking for the guy with the appropriate play of emotions on their face to account for the missing cash. 
Probably not rocket science – "Okay, that’s the guy who complained he was shorted $60 - yup, he looks pretty annoyed. Let’s see the next guy… "
30 years ago, when ATMs were brand new, I got $20 too little from one. Of course the bank claimed otherwise, what proof is there, so I closed my account and that was that. I didn’t use an ATM again for about 10 or 15 years. Never had a problem since then though.
A guy in my office claims to have gotten an extra 20 more than once.
Not an ATM but last week my husband went to the gas station for a soda. He put his $1.25 in the machine and out rolled about 10 Diet Pepsi’s. The station was closed so he couldn’t tell the owner. He still hasn’t – says the machine has eaten his money enough times that now it’s even.
Around 1987, an ATM shorted me by $20. It took about a month to get that cleared up, since the ATM did not belong to my bank.
I once bought a money order at an ATM equipped to sell them, dealing with one of the few eBay vendors that didn’t take Paypal.
You fed bills into the machine, and it gave you change plus your money order.
I had actually used it a couple times before for this purpose with no problems, but on this occasion, I fed it three hundreds and got a money order back for $279. But no change. It just sat there. Finally I pressed the cancel button… and I got back my three hundreds.
So now I’m up $279. I sent off the money order, and a note asking the seller to let me know if there was any problem, because the machine had glitched while dispensing it. A month later, nothing.
So I try to call the ATM people. It was about six hours, total, multip[le calls on the phone to convince them that I owed them $279.
Only once: got shorted $20. It was a stand-alone unit at a gas station. I asked for $200, and partway through the dispensing ("fwoop, fwoop, … ) I saw one of the bills come out at a funny angle. Then I heard several more of the "fwoop"s without the comforting appearance of the corresponding bills. I quickly reached down and cleared out the jam before the final few "fwoop"s, and in the end I had 9 of the expected 10 bills in hand.
I gave the situation a good think-through for 15 seconds or so, reaching the firm conclusion that recovering this $20 was not going to be worth my time.
Phew! I was waiting to read the ending, and was sure I was going to see something like “So I shot the other guy dead and left $800 richer.”
I have never had a discrepancy with an ATM.