ATM Services In Zambia Appalling

Complaints of failure ATMs run by almost all commercial banks in Zambia continue to rise, especially with the advent of the rains which appear to add misery to the service.
Customers say they find notices of “out of service” on many machines each time they wanted to withdraw cash.
Mr Geoffrey Nkandu of Libala said banks in Zambia should improve their ATM services which currently were far below par.
Mr Nkandu said apart from malfunctioning ATMs, some of the machines often run out of money for unexplained reasons.
He said it was not unusual to find ATMs out of service because it had now become the normal way of life in Zambia where service providers were taking their customers too much for granted.
“Unfortunately there is nowhere we can go and complain about this poor service which is being offered to Zambian consumers,” said Mr Nkandu.
Another customer, Ms Esnart Mbewe said she and some of her close friends have suffered considerably at the hands of ATMs which swallowed their cards as they attempted to withdraw money.
Ms Mbewe said once the card was swallowed, to retrieve it was another hustle which left the victim wondering whether it was worth it to keep money in the bank.
“My card has been swallowed by an ATM machine twice for no apparent reason and it takes some good effort to retrieve the document.
‘‘Sometimes I wonder why I bother to keep my money in the bank at all,” said Ms Mbewe.
Mr Boniface Kombwe of Kamwala said apart from failing ATMs, long queues at these machines was also discouraging.
He said ATMs were supposed to speed up service delivery to customers but long queues at some of the ATM sites were the order of the day.
“Actually what has happened is that some banks have simply moved the queues from inside banks to outside where security is poor.
‘‘It does not make any sense at all,” he said
Mr Kombwe appealed to banks to service their ATM machines regularly to improve on their service delivery.