能“对话”的自动取款机

    美国北卡罗莱那州罗利市的沿海联邦信用合作社（Coastal Federal Credit Union）里似乎少了些什么。走进这家银行旗下15家分行中的任何一家，你找不到一位坐在柜台后面的银行出纳员。事实上它的分行里根本就没有出纳柜台，而是由一排类似自动取款机（ATM）的机器在“恭候顾客”，“鼓励”顾客登录，通过视频会议方式与身处数英里之外办公室里的银行出纳员对话并完成交易。欢迎光临，这可能成为未来银行的服务模式。

    如今，成本上涨，同时消费者越来越需要移动交易方式。面对这种情况，各大零售银行目前在分行服务方面正纷纷采用“个人取款机”（personal teller machines）——这种设备类似于视频会议加上集中化出纳服务。除了ATM的典型功能之外，这些虚拟出纳员还可以完成开支票、开设、关闭账户甚至处理贷款等事情。

    “视频银行服务目前仍处于初期阶段，但零售银行服务方面在未来五年内将会发生很多变化，而个人取款机将成为这个新兴形势中的一个重要组成部分，”波士顿研究及咨询公司——赛讯咨询公司（Celent）银行业分析师鲍勃•米拉如是表示。事实上，在赛讯咨询公司今年夏季进行的一项调查中，有近三分之二的信用合作社及三分之一的银行表示，他们早已开始使用、或者计划在未来一年内使用个人取款机、自助服务终端或自助服务亭。

    之所以出现这种趋势，是由于消费者借贷及信用卡消费业务双双下滑，而监管部门推出的新规定对各大银行在透支及借记卡交易方面可以收取的费用设定了限制。由于以开支票方式进行支付的人越来越少，而更多的人喜欢网上银行服务及通过ATM进行交易，各大银行向客户交叉推销新服务的面对面机会也就越来越少了。米拉说：“近年来，零售银行业务一直处境不佳。”

    沿海联邦信用合作社拥有21亿美元的资产，该银行在2008年开始转向使用视频取款机，希望借此能更有效地管理和控制其出纳员的停工时间以及分行人员冗余的状况。该信用合作社目前依靠64台由uGenius研制的机器（uGenius是一家位于盐湖城的初创公司），同时其44名银行出纳员坐在该信用合作社罗利总部大楼里的一个类似呼叫中心的场所里，通过电脑屏幕处理客户发出的交易请求。

    此举似乎已获得了百分百的回报。该信用合作社不仅缩减了旗下分行的实体规模，而且削减了40%的出纳员成本，同时将出纳员的工作时间提高了45％。现在客户可以每周七天、每天从上午7点至下午7点通过出纳员获得银行服务。

    Something's missing at the Coastal Federal Credit Union in Raleigh, N.C. Walk into any of the bank's 15 branches and you'll find not a single bank teller behind the counter. In fact, there's no teller counter at all. Instead, a line of ATM-style machines greets visitors, encouraging them to log in and chat via video-conferencing with bank tellers located in an office located miles away. Welcome to what may become the future of banking.

    Facing increased costs and demand from consumers for more mobile transactions, retail banks are now turning to "personal teller machines," akin to video-conferencing with centralized tellers, for branch service. These virtual tellers can do things like write checks, open and close accounts, even handle loans in addition to the typical ATM functions.

    "Video banking is still nascent but there will be lots of change in retail banking over the next five years, and personal teller machines will be a big part of the emerging landscape," says Bob Meara, a banking analyst at the Boston research and consulting firm Celent. In fact, nearly two-thirds of credit unions and one-third of banks surveyed by Celent this summer say they already use or plan to use personal teller machines, self-service terminals or kiosks within the next year.

    Credit the decline in consumer lending, the drop in credit card spending and new regulation that limits fees banks can charge on overdrafts and debit card transactions. And as fewer people write checks and more people prefer online banking and ATM transactions, banks get fewer face-to-face opportunities to cross-sell new services to customers. "Recent years have not been kind to retail banking," says Meara.

    Coastal Federal, a credit union with $2.1 billion in assets, began moving to the video teller machines in 2008 with hopes of better managing its teller downtime and over-staffed branches. The credit union now relies on 64 machines created by uGenius, a startup in Salt Lake City, while its 44 bank tellers sit inside a call center-like setting at the credit union's Raleigh headquarters handling customer transactions via computer screens.

    The move seems to have paid off. The credit union not only reduced the physical size of its branches but cut teller costs by 40% while increasing teller hours 45%. Customers can now do their banking with tellers seven days a week 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.