Equity Bank has embarked on a new cost-cutting measure that has seen the bank shut down its ATM lobbies.
So far, the bank has closed 11 ATM lobbies. The bank is looking to instead shift its focus on agency and mobile banking.
According to Equity CEO James Mwangi, this shift is informed by evolving preferences of its 9.59 million customers who want to do their banking on the go through mobile phones, or access banking within their neighbourbood via agents.
“Last year Equity conducted a survey and the findings were customers prefer self-service digital banking and have a higher preference for convenience in payment platforms and access to loans,” he says.
One in every five ATMs in Kenya belongs to Equity Bank, thanks to an aggressive expansion strategy. It had 520 ATMs as at December 2016 when the total industry count was 2,656 machines, according to Central Bank of Kenya data. The Equity ATMs processed 24.8 million transactions in the period.