ATM inventor John Shepherd-Barron dies | Hacker News Reader

ATM inventor John Shepherd-Barron dies

thebln.com

"...and cash machines have been largely the same ever since."

Cash machines are on of the things I desperately want innovation and customization. If I go to an ATM more than twice and get the same amount of money, I want that as a quick select option. Same with language selection. The reason this isn't happening (as told by bank employees) is the regulation and the way the infrastructure is set up. But some storage coupled with one-way encryption on the machine itself (no protocols or data-transfer problems) should be possible, no?

Also, I'd like big red warning stickers on ATM's that run Windows NT or 98 still, so I can avoid them at all cost ;)

my atm (wells fargo) has quick select for 3 most used actions.

unfortunately, it has with-receipt and no-receipt versions of the same thing wasting a spot.

Royal Bank of Canada has a quick selection option. You configure how much cash you want, from which account, and if you want a printed receipt, then after you've entered your PIN you have a 'My Quick Cash' button.

Not bad, but it should be implicit. Hell, even the Pizza Pizza IVR has an option to re-order the same thing you ordered last time.

Implicit? I think having to explicitly press the "Quick cash" button is much better than not being able to do a different transaction at all. Like, for example, change the setting.

I'm still amazed that a customer-focused bank doesn't run away with the other bank's lunch... (at least here Uruguay/SA)

I guess the barrier of entry is just too damned hard. I know I'm in a defeatist mood whenever I have to do business at a bank (and heaven forbid if it is a state-run bank - those have some convenient "soft" credits but so much bureaucracy that I'm seriously thinking an extra half percentage point can't be too bad in exchange for this bureoucratic hell)

Is it a case of banks' customers not being who you think they are?

You're probably right. Maybe it would be nice that there was a bank where the customers were us salarymen.

OTOH they probably already exist - there are lots of pseudo-bank financial institutions over here (basically lending co-ops) with very flexible working hours, and awfully big interest rates, but they only provide some of the bank's services (short-term lending at those abusive rates mostly), you don't get stuff like mortgages, car buying credits, savings accounts, or investment opportunities (even though they might make a great place to get good interest since they're lending money at such a big interest rate).

FNB in South Africa has a learning quick select feature for withdrawals like the one you describe. After I withdrew the same amount a couple of times it appeared on the main screen as a quick select option.

Same with language. I'm sure I was asked at some point what my language preference was, but since then I've never had to tell an FNB ATM my language choice. I still do for other banks, but that's probably because language preference isn't amongst the pieces of data which banks share between each other.

So it can be done. You don't need local storage on the ATM itself, just a few additional attributes requested and sent down when the ATM retrieves the customer account data from whichever central servers it's using.

Bank of America ATMs do this. After entering your PIN, you just press the Fast Cash button rather than the normal OK button, and it'll give you your standard amount and then return your card.

Those of us who are old enough to remember having to work to get to the bank before it closed may appreciate this more.

Yes. Being pedantic, he didn't really change my life since I was born well after ATMs were widespread and have never known a world without them.

A little more detail and background here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/may/20/cash-machine-invent...

My dad was involved in the network architecture of ATMs/cashpoints for UK banks in the 80s.. not sure if this ever happened, but there was an urban myth of some early installations where one ATM was distributing 200 pounds no matter what was punched in on the keypad. No-one informed the local bank, but the next day there was just this huge queue of people checking out this new cashpoint thingy...

I heard an interview with him on Radio 4 a couple of years ago. The pin number was going to be 6 digits but he tested it on his wife and all she could remember was 4.

Just think. Without this man's contribution, professors would have no way of demonstrating threading/concurrency problems.

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