DBS Bank Taiwan (星展台灣) yesterday said that it would discontinue operations for its 40 automated teller machines (ATMs) in Taiwan from next month, as clients shift to online services.
DBS had installed an ATM at each of its 40 branches in Taiwan, but it plans to remove 10 machines next month and the remaining 30 machines at the beginning of next year, the bank said in a statement.
Clients who need to withdraw cash could see a branch teller or use another bank’s ATM, DBS said.
“We have found that more customers have less of a need to withdraw cash,” reducing ATM usage, the bank said.
Instead of paying in cash, clients have developed the habit of paying with credit, either cards or mobile payment tools, it said.
“Most clients transfer money on our fast and convenient Internet banking service,” DBS said.
Taiwan has the highest density of ATMs worldwide — more than 30,000 machines — with most people using the ATMs at MRT stations or convenience stores, the bank said.
Taiwan is the second market in which DBS would stop providing ATM service, after removing all of its ATMs from China in 2017, it said, adding that most Chinese customers switched to using Alipay (支付寶) and WeChat Pay (微信支付).
However, parent company DBS Bank Ltd has no plan to remove its ATMs from Singapore, as it is the largest bank there and many customers still use ATMs, it said.
Unlike DBS Taiwan, most Taiwanese banks continue to install ATMs nationwide to provide diversified services, such as currency exchange, Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) data showed.
The number of ATMs in the nation reached 30,080 as of the end of August, from 28,959 a year earlier, while the amount of aggregate transactions via the machines expanded to NT$1.01 trillion (US$33.03 billion) from NT$966.26 billion a year earlier, the data showed.
The FSC said that DBS Taiwan’s plan to remove ATMs from its branches does not need its approval, but Banking Bureau Deputy Director-General Huang Kuang-hsi (黃光熙) added that the commission requires the bank to report how it continues to protect customers’ rights and benefits.
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