“Cash services”: three major banks will pool their ATMs

Europe 1 with AFP 3:53 p.m., February 15, 2023

BNP Paribas, Société Générale and Crédit Mutuel Federal Alliance, which owns the CIC network, will start from the fourth quarter of 2023 to pool the approximately 15,000 ATMs they manage in France.

Called "Cash services", able to reduce the number of ATMs and operating costs, this project will "sustainably perpetuate the self-service banking to which the French are attached, in urban areas as in rural areas", underline the three banking groups in a joint press release published on Wednesday.

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A project already announced in 2021

The project was announced in October 2021, but is taking place a little later than expected.

In October 2022, the Deputy CEO of BNP Paribas, Thierry Laborde, responsible in particular for retail banking networks, mentioned a launch for early 2023. If they do not yet communicate on the number of distributors available when the project will be fully deployed , that is, at the end of 2025, banking institutions indicate that the offer for each of the customers will be reinforced "up to 3 times".

The smallest of the networks concerned, CIC, comprising approximately 2,100 ATMs at the end of 2021, this suggests that there will remain at least 6,300 "Cash Services" distributors throughout the territory, which would represent a sharp reduction compared to the existing total for the three groups. accumulated.

It is the urban areas where the four brands cohabit - BNP Paribas, SG (the new brand resulting from the merger between Société Générale and Crédit du Nord), Crédit Mutuel and CIC - which are the main areas concerned by this pooling project.

Maintenance of distributors in rural areas

No ATM should be closed in rural and isolated areas, assured one of the three banks during the presentation of the initial project.

The "Cash Services" distributors will give the possibility of withdrawing or depositing banknotes and coins, depositing checks, consulting their balance or editing an RIB.

The banks "are trying to optimize the number of ATMs present in the territory" because "it is of course a cost center", explained in November the director of fiduciary affairs at the Banque de France, Christophe Baud-Berthier.

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Fewer distributors means less supply costs, maintenance costs, the comings and goings of money carriers... The total number of distributors is already on the decline in France: the metropolis has lost a few on average more than 2 per day in 2021. It had 47,853 ATMs at the end of the same year, according to the Banque de France, i.e. almost 10% less than at the end of 2018.