Banks have a lot of reason to maximize efficiency in handling cash, because so much of what bank tellers do on a daily basis has to do with it. Banks also need to keep close tabs on how much cash is needed from week to week, so they know how much to order in or what to sell off. Having separate cash drawers for each teller station means reconciling all the totals every day, requiring time-consuming counting and reconciliations. Tellers who are new and inexperienced at cash handling are also put at a disadvantage; they are more at risk of making errors in customer transactions, and also taking longer to count and reconcile any cash in their stations. One modern way to make the entire process of teller transactions faster and more efficient is to use currency recyclers at teller stations.
A currency recycler is able to dispense, accept, sort, and store currency from a bank teller or from two tellers, depending on the setup. The software that interacts with the currency recycler determines what currency needs to be dispensed depending on the transaction a customer wants to make, and automatically offers it to the teller who only needs to recount and check the transaction before completing it with the customer. Cash deposits are also simplified, as the recycler accepts the cash, and automatically sorts it into individual storage cassettes for each denomination of currency.
Using a currency recycler means less cash is needed at each teller station, because the recycler intelligently tracks deposits and withdrawals, and recycles cash for immediate use. The software system for the recycler makes it faster and easier to reconcile all the transactions made in a day or week, and determine how much cash is available for the bank to use in transactions. This means less cash needs to be kept on hand to make sure that cash is available, no matter if all transactions have been reconciled or not. The time needed for bank staff to count and manage currency is reduced across the board, both in teller transactions and in back-office counting and reconciliations.
The increased efficiency of teller transactions means that customer time, as well as teller time, is saved, enabling a bank to offer fast and accurate service. Tellers are also empowered to cross sell services to customers, because of the reduction in time created by the currency recycler. There is more time to identify customer needs and offer solutions when less time is absorbed by manual cash handling. New tellers can also be brought up to speed quickly with training on the cash recycler system, and errors are minimized for new tellers and experienced tellers alike when the currency recycler assists in dispensing the right amount of cash for each transaction.
Banks need to stay ahead of technology developments in order to offer the best service to their customers. In many ways technology is moving transactions online or to self-service options, but there will always be a need for in-person transactions with bank tellers. Currency recyclers help to make these transactions efficient and correct every single time, increasing levels of customer service while reducing a bank's overhead in cash on hand, and staff cash management time.