Branch totals vary widely, from $5,998.07 a month year-to-date at the Oxnard branch to $27,645.25 at the West Covina branch.
According to Kathie Chism, vice president of branch operations for 11 of the credit union’s locations, approximately 80% of the deposits go into checking accounts. With a $541.1 million balance in share draft accounts as of third quarter 2017, that might seem like small change, but that’s not what this is all about.
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“We’ve had coin machines since 2006, and members have grown to love the service,” Chism says. “It’s like an ATM. Once you have it there, you can’t really pull it out.”
The credit union tiers usage fees according to its Signature Membership program. Approximately 35% of its members are in the highest tier and enjoy unlimited fee waivers. Another 31% get 12 fee waivers per year. The 22% of the membership who are not Signature Membership participants pay 5% per coinage redeemed. Youth accounts are fee-free all the time. Non-members account for 8% of the machine’s use and pay 10% per coinage redeemed.
Chism says total fee income is not significant, running between $1,400 and $1,800 a month.
More than 190,000 Wescom members have brought in nearly $350,000 in coin deposits on average every month this year through October.
Although the direct deposit feature sealed the deal, there are other functional benefits to the new machines. They are quieter, for one. And the fact they are less prone to jamming combined with other operating issues has saved the credit union thousands in maintenance costs. Plus, the machines have greater physical capacity and offer a more robust reporting functionality than the coin counters they replaced, Chism says.
“That improved service to the member ― seeing their deposit immediately credited ― is really the top selling point,” Chism says.
Improved service also comes in the form of teller attention. The machines free staff from mundane transactions so they can focus on members with more high-priority items.
To offer direct deposit, the coin machines are integrated into the core processing system. This eliminates the hassle of dealing with lost receipts. On the back side, the improved, on-screen reporting simplifies balancing the general ledger and tracking inventory and usage.
“The audit trail is great,” Chism says.