Banks’ ATMs disappeared for 6 years… 14,000 ATMs gone, 1,000 branches closed.

Kang Minkook “Ignoring Publicness and Accessibility in Actions”, ‘As bank branches decrease and even cash ATMs rapidly withdraw, voices are emerging that these measures are not considering the financially vulnerable.’,
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, ‘According to the data requested by Kang Minkook, a member of the main opposition People Power Party, to the Financial Supervisory Service on the 24th, a total of 14,426 ATMs were withdrawn from bank branches from 2018 to the end of last month. By year, the numbers are as follows: 2,102 in 2018, 2,318 in 2019, 2,770 in 2020, 2,506 in 2021, 2,424 in 2022, 1,646 last year, and 660 until the end of last month.’,
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, ‘The decrease in ATMs was prominent in the metropolitan area. In Seoul and Gyeonggi, 4,468 (31%) and 2,847 (19.7%) ATMs were withdrawn, leading to a total of 7,981 (55.3%) decreased in the metropolitan area. Busan also recorded a decrease of 1,179 (8.2%) ATMs.’,
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, ‘The number of closed bank branches from 2018 to the end of last month amounted to 1,003. The number of closed branches exceeded 200 each year from 2020 to 2022. However, the pace slowed down to 97 last year and 43 until the end of last month.’,
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, ‘In consideration of critical public opinion, cases of downsizing branches into branches or outlets have increased instead of closing them. From 2018 to the end of last year, a total of 321 branches were converted into outlets. The region with the most cases of conversion was Seoul, with 75 branches (23.4%) turned into outlets. Outlets typically handle simple personal financial services such as deposits, savings, home mortgages, and consumer loans.’,
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, ‘The removal of ATMs or bank branches by commercial banks is interpreted as a means to reduce costs in the process of promoting business digitization. For example, as of last year, Shinhan Bank’s average operating cost per branch was 2.45 billion won, while outlets operate without separate operating budgets by integrating them with the main branch’s budget. The operating personnel also decreased significantly, with branches having 12.6 employees on average compared to outlets with only 3.1 employees.’,
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, ‘Member of Parliament Kang stated, “The continuous closure of branches and massive withdrawal of ATMs by banks even in non-deficit situations is an action that ignores the publicness that banks should uphold and the accessibility of financial consumers such as the elderly.” He also emphasized that “financial authorities should thoroughly check whether banks are faithfully implementing the joint closure process of branches, and when evaluating banks’ regional investments, they should expand the deduction penalty for branch reduction to ensure financial accessibility.”’,
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