The latest moves by some banking institutions to keep their market share has met with a furious response in some quarters. The latest innovation allows customers using cash machines who have requested the withdrawal of an amount of money to press a ‘gamble button’ and thereby either double the money they are withdrawing or lose it.
"The banks have seen that in other sectors not keeping your eye on the ball can lead to a huge loss of positioning particularly to ecommerce or web based rivals.” explained retail banking analyst Haroun el-Makhri. “The high street banks know they are not immune to that form of competition and are trying to make their product more exciting but whether this is really the best way forward is questionable.”
An employee of one of the banks said “This is being done in partnership with a well-known betting group and essentially once the money has been transferred into the gambling system the contract is with them and not with the bank. However we are ensuring that only certain withdrawal amounts will be permitted to be gambled and these will be capped.”
Nonetheless, Joy Farmer of Concerning Addiction said “This makes me very angry. It exposes people to gambling who would not normally consider it and it is also likely to impact on the most vulnerable. We are going to see scores of customers walking away from ATMs broke and empty handed.”
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