BoA's new ATM desposit process

Bank of America has done away with deposit envelopes for its ATMs. Instead, you just feed your bills and checks into a feeder. It will read in the bills and tally up the cash. As for checks, the ATM attempts to read the amount the check is for, and if it cannot read it, the ATM will prompt you for the check amount.

I discovered this when I went to deposit a check. I think the innovation will save time and money for Bank of America, but not necessarily its customers. I waited longer than usual for two people to make deposits. Some of this may have been due to their unfamiliarity with the process, or it may have been due to them feeding in more than one check as opposed to a single envelope.

Fortunately, BoA limits the number of dollar bills you can deposit to 40. Still, I wouldn't want to be stuck behind the guy depositing 40 bills.... or checks. Or worse, both!

There is one customer benefit to all this. The transaction receipt for a check deposit will have an image of the check on it. I find that to be helpful as sometimes I will deposit a check but forget who it was from. This way I can look at the receipt at home and immediately know who wrote the check and why. Additionally, I wonder if now you will see an image of the deposited check when you view the transaction online or your monthly statement.

Update: You now see the check image when you view your transaction online! Very useful when updating and balancing your check book at home.