It will take close to eight months to finish recalibrating ATMs for the Rs 200 notes, and even then, you might find a few ATMs that won't be equipped with the new currency
ATM recalibration involves replacing the cassettes that hold the currency notes
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If time is money, then the new Rs 200 notes are going to cost Mumbaikars way too much. According to data procured from NCR and AGS, two of the city's largest ATM manufacturers, it will take approximately 3,50,000 minutes, or 243 days, to finish recalibrating ATMs across Mumbai, Thane and Navi Mumbai with the new Rs 200 notes.
Navroze Dastur, director, NCR
AGS Transact Technologies and NCR Corporation India together account for 10,500 ATMs across the three cities, of which 8,750 are yet to be equipped with the new currency note. There are approximately 5,000 ATMs in the city under AGS, belonging to various different banks. "We have calibrated about 20-25% of these in the last two weeks," said Stanley Johnson, head of outsourcing at AGS.
Time-consuming process
"It takes about 40 minutes to an hour to recalibrate one ATM and reconfigure its software; during this time a customer cannot use the machine for transactions. We estimate the remaining ATMs will be reconfigured within the next 30-45 days," he added. He further pointed out that as of now, private banks were leading the charge in recalibrating their ATM machines.
NCR has a total of 5,500 ATMs under different banks across Mumbai, Thane, and Navi Mumbai. "This calibration activity requires an engineer to visit each ATM along with the cash-in-transit company," said Navroze Dastur, director at NCR. Dastur added that although they had received requests from banks to recalibrate some of their ATMs, "the banks may not decide to recalibrate all the ATMs." "Till now we have recalibrated around 450-500 units in Mumbai; we go where the banks tell us," he stated. But if the new notes are not available everywhere, is there any point to issuing the new currency?
'Won't be like DeMo'
Both, NCR and AGS agree that unlike the demonetisation phase, when it took nearly two months to recalibrate all the ATMs across the country, this time there will be no hold-up as far as the Rs 200 notes are concerned. "That (demonetisation) was a massive activity, as it had to be done at all ATMs, which is why it took close to 60 days to complete," said Dastur. "During that time all the ATMs were non-operational, which will not be the case now.
"It will cause no inconvenience to customers, as they will still be able to operate the ATMs. The machine will be out of service only for the duration of recalibration, which will be 40 minutes. We are well staffed to handle this activity." Johnson echoed: "The only time customers will not be able to transact is if they walk into the ATM while the machine is being recalibrated."
8,750
ATMs left to be recalibrated
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