The technology used in ATMs has gone through various phases from basic payment functions to value-added functions such as balance enquiry, printing statements and cash-in and cheque-in facilities.

Banking customers also used ATM for cash deposits, but more so the ATM is used for withdrawing cash. However due to differing nature in the business environment, there are certain pockets in every city where traders form queues to deposit money every morning.

In response to this, AGS Infotech in association with Wincor-Nixdorf has introduced ProCash 4000 - a compact cash recycling system for cash service transactions. But cutomers can deposit cash even in a conventional ATM, so why ProCash 4000?

“ProCash 4000 functions on the Long-Edge insertion technology thereby reducing the chances of note jams by four times i.e. from one in twelve thousand to one in fourty/fourty five thousand,” retorts Sunil Udupa, president and CEO, AGS Infotech.

It is intriguing to note here that along with private banks, public sector banks have also shown an encouraging response to ProCash 4000.

Along with the Long-Edge Insertion technology, another prominent feature of ProCash 4000 is its ability to split the notes on the basis of whether they are machine fit, counterfeit or suspicious (torn or patched-up). Immediately after the notes are deposited, they fall into the box known as Escrow where the sensors track the notes at a speed of eight notes per second. After the money is deposited, it immediately gets credited in the customer’s A/c.

Commenting on the future of the new machine, Murthy Veer Ghanta, president, Vsoft said, “For bank branches in typical geographical locations with more of cash deposit and withdrawal usage, ProCash 4000 may even tempt banks to open more branches offering the same services. The machine will also serve banks in decreasing their ATM downtime due to lack of cash. However the banks will have to put in trained employees initially, to help customers understand the process.”

“Although ProCash 4000 will considerably help banks to reduce their human and infrastructure costs, it still remains to be seen how effectively the machine is able to compare the genuine notes from the counterfeit and suspicious ones,” stated Sanjay Sharma, advisor - IT, IDBI Bank.

However Udupa reinstates, “The machine is tested for Retail Banking environments. Despite that, a bank must designate a trained employee to co-ordinate with customers as regards the type of notes that are machine fit. It will take some time for the customers to understand about the quality of notes to be deposited. Just how when the ATM was introduced, the banks were trained about the machine fit notes and thus any ATM today is programmed to throw out only good notes.”