{"id":821642,"date":"2025-04-26T16:02:52","date_gmt":"2025-04-26T14:02:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=821642"},"modified":"2025-04-26T16:02:59","modified_gmt":"2025-04-26T14:02:59","slug":"big-banks-closing-atms-across-south-africa","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/banking\/821642\/big-banks-closing-atms-across-south-africa\/","title":{"rendered":"Big banks closing ATMs across South Africa"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Many of South Africa\u2019s largest banks are closing ATMs across the country as people move away from cash and adopt digital payment methods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Visa and Discovery Bank SpendTrend report for 2025 showed that while people still use cash for many reasons, including habit, its prevalence is losing its appeal.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The report noted that 84% of South Africans surveyed prefer using cards or digital payments whenever possible.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis shift is especially noticeable among younger consumers, with 83% saying they use digital payments more than the year before,\u201d Discovery said. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Additionally, 67% of respondents who use cash said they use it only a few times a month. Over 93% of South Africans said they prefer digital payment for anything over R100. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCash is becoming less common as a payment method, with most South Africans now favouring digital transactions,\u201d said Discovery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWith digital payment options offering greater convenience, better incentives and increased security, cash is gradually being replaced, and this trend shows no sign of slowing down.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This growing trend means that the need for ATMs nationwide will continue to shrink as more South Africans adopt digital alternatives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is evident in the number of ATMs major banks have closed in recent years due to the uptake of digital alternatives. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to an analysis by Mybroadband, the Big Four banks\u2014Absa, FNB, Nedbank, and Standard Bank\u2014closed 233 ATMs in the first half of 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The biggest cutters were Standard Bank and Absa, which shut down 76 and 75 ATMs, respectively, over the past year. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nedbank followed with 42 and FNB with 40. Capitec is the only major bank that has increased its number of ATMs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to its interim financials for the period from March to August 2024, Capitec increased its ATMs from 8,382 to 8,749, a jump of 367.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, it is important to note that a large share of this increase is likely not its own ATMs but those of partners like retailers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ATM extinction forecast for South Africa<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
\"\"<\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

A study<\/a><\/strong> conducted by Merchant Machine revealed that several countries, including South Africa, have seen a notable reduction in ATM numbers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The study used World Bank data to find the number of ATMs available per 100,000 people in each country across the past 10 years of available data.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A statistical model was run using this data to predict when each country would drop below one ATM, i.e. cashless, based on the current shrinkage rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interestingly, the data revealed that seven countries are projected to lose their final ATM within the next 25 years, and they\u2019re all in Europe.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Norway and Ireland are projected to lose their last ATM in 11 years, while Lithuania is expected to follow in the next 14 years. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Looking at the reduction of ATMs in these countries, Lithuania had the fastest shrinkage rate, losing 45.7% of its ATMs annually since 2012. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Norway follows with a 44.5% reduction, and Ireland is in close third place, seeing a 41.9% decline in its cash machine numbers nationwide. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In comparison, South Africa has experienced an annual shrinkage rate of 2.67% in the number of ATMs nationwide since 2012.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

According to the Merchant Machine\u2019s estimates, this means South Africa could be ATM-free in 32 years’ time. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Interestingly, some big banks noted that rising crime in South Africa has become a factor in reducing the number of ATMs in the country. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This growing issue was recently highlighted by the targeting of multiple ATMs at a shopping mall in Hammanskraal, Pretoria, in March 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It was reported that a group of around 30 suspects stormed the premises and targeted five ATMs and a drop safe in one of the shops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Protecting and insuring ATMs against bombings by criminal syndicates costs banks millions of rand each year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

ATMs are also a soft target for installing card-skimming devices and capturing PINs, which are used to clone cards and defraud banking customers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

South Africa\u2019s biggest banks are closing ATMs as more people move away from cash to digital payments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":92,"featured_media":821675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[961],"tags":[29,5621,2002,12923,76,1799,853,499],"class_list":["post-821642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-banking","tag-absa","tag-atms","tag-capitec-bank","tag-discovery-bank","tag-fnb","tag-nedbank","tag-south-africa","tag-standard-bank"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/92"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=821642"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821642\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":821704,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/821642\/revisions\/821704"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/821675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=821642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=821642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=821642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}