The spread of ATMs began almost 40 years ago: in fact, the first issue of debit cards equipped with a magnetic strip to make withdrawals at the designated ATMs dates back to 1983. This is the first version of this form of electronic money that uses the ATM circuit, which since 1986 also allows payments through POS abilities.
In our country, the term ATM is used to refer to withdrawal operations at branches, even if they are not specifically linked to the ATM circuit.
Crazy news: that’s when you can no longer use the ATM
Unlike cash, ATMs fall into the category of “well-liked” payments by European governments and nations. The reason is simple, being one of the forms of monetary transfer exclusively traceable and therefore taxable, and this is also demonstrated by the support from the Italian government in what is a real policy of Cashless.
However, the role of the ATM is also a “victim” of this trend, given that, apart from withdrawals, ATMs are no longer so used for other operations, such as sending money through wire transfers.
This is evident from the decreasing number of ATMs present on the national territory, a trend that will inevitably lead sooner or later to the total “disappearance” of the cards, even if this should not happen soon, even if what has been decided by banking institutions such as those of the ING group (known in Italy as Conto Arancio) in 2021 is quite emblematic.
ING’s choice to remove all sorts of branches, including ATMs, is rather particular but not so absurd, given the intention to dedicate itself exclusively to online services, among other things already shared by modern banks, such as N26.
The “end” of the ATM is not near, but it is not even that impossible to predict: starting from the next decade the context could be very different from the current one.
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