OREANDA-NEWS. January 25, 2013. In recent years, ICBC pushes self-service banking in response to the need of financial services from customers. The Bank's ATM (Automatic Teller Machine) expansion includes function upgrade, operation management and maintenance in order to provide fast, safe and convenient financial services to customers, reported the press-centre of ICBC. 

ICBC has installed over 66,000 ATMs by end-2012, out of which, 13,600 ATMs were installed in 2012. Efficient utilization of ICBC ATMs also enhanced. In 2012, ICBC ATM transactions rose 26% from a year ago to 6.53 billion involving a total amount of RMB 6.7 trillion or a jump of 40% over the previous year. One ICBC ATM processes more than RMB 300,000 in 300+ transactions each day on average.

In ICBC's ATM expansion, new ATMs are installed in areas where there is a strong demand for self-service such as residential communities, busy downtown, merchandize marts, tourist spots. In particular, more ATMs are installed in counties adding the total to 20,200 as of today, in a bid to better cater to the need of financial services from customers in these areas.

With more ATMs installed, ICBC addresses the diverse needs of customers by taking all necessary steps to enhance the convenience and user-friendliness of self-service banking. That includes innovative service measures, improved ATM functions, better operation management system, emergency services and extended service hours. An example, ICBC announced higher limit for one cash advance at ATM, from RMB 2,500 to RMB 3,000. Limit of one cash advance at CRS (Cash Recycling System) increased from RMB 2500 to RMB 5,000, less steps for customers and faster services.

Meanwhile ICBC also spends conscious effort on the upgrade of self-service functions to improve customer experience. A range of new ATM services such as cash deposit at ATM without using card/passbook, ETC co-branded card top-up, bill payment by passbook at self-service devices, fast cash withdrawal, operation counter alert, authentication by dynamic password and multi-lingual interfaces are launched to enhance the availability, security and user-friendliness of ATMs.

Today, at ICBC ATMs besides cash transactions such as cash deposit/withdrawal, transfer/remittance or balance enquiry, customers can also pay all kinds of fees (water, electricity, gas, communication, traffic fine), check provident fund, draw cash using foreign card, use e-cash and all other non-cash services related to people's everyday life.