Today, it is not unusual again to see people queue up outside the banking halls in front of the ATM machines, contrary to the way it would have been viewed as chaos some few years ago.

This is basically because the ATM as a computerized telecommunications device, provides the customers  with access to financial transactions in public space without the need for a human clerk or bank teller.

Ordinarily, security would have been the biggest problem for this technological development but for most modern ATMs, the moment a user inserts the plastic card with a magnetic stripe or the plastic smart card with a chip that contain a unique card number and some security information such as an expiration date, he only gets identified by providing a valid personal Identification Number(PIN). So the issue becomes how one can keep his security codes safe.

However, the ATM has been touted to have numerous benefits that make it preferential to using human teller and Hi-Tech sought the opinion of users and operators to find out what they are.

On a visit to one of the new generational banks in Lagos, its Head, Banking operations, Mrs. Pat Odita, said that using ATM makes it easier for customers to access their bank accounts, make cash withdrawals, check their account balance and also purchase mobile phone prepaid airtime.

According to her, the introduction of the cash machine has brought about some positive improvement in the banking operation. The technology she said, has cut-off some protocols previously observed in withdrawal of money and makes it easier and faster to do so.

This is in addition to the features of the ATM which apparently is customer friendly and interactive. It has reduced the crowd often seen in the banking halls as customers can withdraw cash at their own convenience more especially non-working hours and public holidays.

According to Ebiere Okoro, a student who said she started using the money machine for more than four months ago, said that “ATM is very effective and since I started using it, it has not disappointed me” So also did Tunde Ogunjoei, a sales representative who has been using the ATM for more than a year, said that he has had no regrets using ATM as  it enables him make withdrawals at his own convenient time and  avoiding the stress of queuing up in the banking hall.

He emphasized the usefulness of the ATM during emergency periods. during the Trade fair Exhibition,some customers who run short of cash quickly rushed to the cash machine to make withdrawals for the payment of the goods purchased”

These however have not played down the weaknesses of the invention as many of the users recount their ordeals with the pay machine. It may sound unbelievable that some fellows monitor closely unsuspecting users’ transactions in order to steal their PIN and make unauthorised withdrawals.

Some others generate dubious reports on the internet about a non existing facility overhaul of an operators platform and distribute same to unsuspecting users who would fall prey by changing their PINs on the phoney websites.

For instance, a business man in Trade fair who also uses the ATM machine shared his experience. According to him, he has once been debited with N5000 without making the withdrawal while his bank could not rectify the problem. He claimed that his pin was manipulated.

However, some others do not believe that ATM has saved anything. To buttress their claim, they complained of regular unavailability of service in the money machine, making for inability to withdraw money when necessarily required.

For Mr Joshua Iyatse, ATM is a mistake in Nigeria.  Iyatse, a Lagos based business man, added that “it doesn’t dispense cash when it is desperately needed, I have cried times without number about the fraud and heartbreak which the ATM machine gives users, to no avail and I have decided to leave as a necessary evil”.

However, banks said they are not to be blamed for any form of fraud, adding that “the user must have compromised their PIN code in one way or the other before any fraud could take place. Fraud does not just happen like that” said a senior official of one of the new generational bank’s located along the Badagry expressway.

Perhaps deployers of ATM machines may have to improve on the security of the machine, as that has been the major complaint of the average users of the technology.

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