For the longest time, I refused to deposit cheques in the ATM . This after reading horror stories about stolen cheques and the like from nefarious false fronts that steal cheques. Still, after a while, I started using this technology (usually because the lines for the tellers were so long). I previously wrote about not wanting to use my home WiFi (and never public WiFi) for online banking. I am that paranoid. Still, I do most of my online banking using my laptop, connected via WiFi (but not public WiFi). Am I a lover of old financial technology only?
Last night I caught myself in another one of my “still thinking like a cranky old guy†habits. I was taking cheques with me to work so that I could deposit them on the way home at the ATM at the bank. I dutifully went out of my way to stop at the bank and deposit the cheques, but since TD has gone to a new ATM interface, I wondered why I wasn’t doing the “take a photo of the cheque†deposit method.
The TD ATM is simply photographing the cheque and ‘parsing’ it (although they keep the cheques, although I have no idea whether the darn things are archived or just shredded after a few days), the same methodology as if I was using my phone. Why didn’t I use my phone? The only explanation I can give is old habits die hard, and I keep forgetting about some features available from my bank.
I still feel some paranoia, so I tend to photograph my cheques with WiFi turned off and using my Cell Phone Providers network (marginally more secure), but I have to remember that the feature exists in the first place.
Old financial technology was helpful at the time, but maybe it is time for me to move on.
Old Financial Technology
Remember, the core of banking is still based on COBOL, and will for a long time to come.
We just took on a few new people onto our family cell phone plan. While this will save us all money, I was complaining because it meant more checks to take to the ATM, something that we were trying to reduce, not expand. Then it dawned on me that I could do the ‘take a picture’ method and it was like the dawn of a brand new day! I think sometimes it’s just what you’re used to.
PC financial also has new ATMs. I walked by it the first time, because I thought they ran out of envelopes. Should save a whole lot of paper.