By Our Reporter
SHILLONG: SBI ATMs either have long queues or have no money. This is a common phenomenon. On Thursday SBI customers had a tough time obtaining cash from its ATMs across the city.
Several customers had to return empty hand from at least two ATMs since there was no money. The ATM at Laban Main Road (opposite Shiv Temple) had no money since morning until late evening.
An irate customer said, “I went to the ATM this morning and after feeding in all the details the machine says there is no money.”
Another customer with a similar complaint said he had to go to his bank branch later and stand in a long queue. Similar views were echoed some other customers who went to collect money from the SBI ATM at Hotel Grace, PB Deb Road, Jail Road.
A long line of customers had queued in front of this ATM.
“This ATM did not have money throughout the day. The machine takes at least five minutes to dispense cash or to inform that there is no money,” said a customer.
One ATM card holder who came out empty handed complained, “The ATM is in bad shape. It is evident that there was an attempt to loot money from here. The monitor is broken so the authorities must repair it.”
Many customers said there should be some indicator to inform customers that there is no money. The affected customers from the Hotel Grace ATM later used the Vijaya Bank and IDBI Bank ATMs located nearby.
In the same way, customers of the ATM at Laban Main Road had to depend on the UBI ATM facility in the adjacent building.
Customers make use of ATMs to meet their emergency cash requirement. But they are let down all the time.
Meanwhile, R Paramasivan, Assistant General Manager, Region-I, SBI said a parallel security chest was under construction to meet customer demands.
“Once it is ready customers would not face problem in withdrawing cash from ATMs in future,” he said.
On the present problem he said that after the cash reserves falls down a certain level the software indicates to the Mumbai Headquarters which in return informs the outsourcing agency to fill up the tray.
“Sometimes they respond immediately but on some occasions due to link failure there are delays,” he said.