News

Access For All: A Follow-Up

A meeting of ATM Industry professionals and blind advocacy groups didn't resolve any issues, but the dialogue was encouraging.

February 6, 2002

On the weekend of January 26, a group of bankers, ATM industry professionals, and blind advocacy groups met in Washington, D.C. to discuss the future of ATMs and their accessibility to the blind community.

"It went well. We had a productive discussion that covered a lot of territory. We agreed to meet again, and continue the discussion," said Bill Raymond, senior VP and ATM channel manager of Bank of America, and one of several representatives of the banking industry at the meeting. The American Bankers Association organized the event.

Indeed, the response to the meeting and its expected repercussions seems to be positive from both sides. Curtis Chong, director of technology for the National Federation of the Blind, was encouraged.

"We had meetings with a variety of banks, and some of the switching vendors and ATM manufacturers. I think that overall, the meeting went very well - it was a good first meeting," Chong said. "I don't think you could call it a negotiation; it was 'let's get acquainted, here are the issues as we see them.' And everybody concluded by the time we were done that meetings like this were very helpful, and that we should have more of them. And hopefully we will, in the next few months, so we can keep this line of communication open."

Chong, who has been closely involved with the issue since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) roughly a decade ago, left the meeting more optimistic than he entered. Although ironclad details and plans of action were not the focus of the meetings, he said he felt good about the improved atmosphere of collaboration with the banking executives.

"Blind people have a heck of a time understanding why the banks are apparently dragging their feet, from the consumer point of view," he said. "The bank's point of view is, 'we don't know what you guys want, there's no standard,' that sort of thing. The fact that you could get these people into the same room and not have them confront each other is a huge step forward in this business. Once you can start the dialogue going, then there's going to be some willingness to not stand hard and fast on fixed positions."

Some of the topics that were addressed at the meeting include:

• How to best approach the low-end machine - the inexpensive ATM that perhaps does not have enough memory or expansion capabilities to allow it to become voice-enabled.
• The frustration experienced by the blind because of technology in general - ATMs are not the only devices that are becoming increasingly involved, increasingly computer-driven, and less accessible to the blind. (For instance, Chong points out that stoves with touch-pad operation are much less useful to the blind than the old counterpart with knobs that could be easily felt.)
• Discussion about whether or not voice guidance is the way to go. A consensus was reached that voice guidance is essential for accessible ATMs.
• Clarification about Braille on keyboards. According to the NFB, it is a common misconception that all blind people read Braille - according to NFB figures, only 10-15 percent of the blind population does. Furthermore, Braille doesn't tell the user what's going on onscreen.

One major topic which apparently was not discussed in great detail was that of retrofitting - what to do with the countless ATMs already in existence. Chong said that the issue was not thoroughly dissected at this meeting, but that "[the retrofitting issue] has to be worked out in an atmosphere of trust and open communication, and I think prior to this meeting, we might not have had as much trust and communication as we would have liked."

Now that some groundwork has been laid, he hopes that future conferences will get into the specifics of retrofitting.

According to Chong, one chief message was delivered to the banking industry at the meeting was that the time to work on accessibility is now.

"Think about the blind when you're at the lab, when you're at the drawing board," he said, "not after you've already built the machine."

All parties involved would agree that one meeting is certainly not going to solve the problems of ATM accessibility; but the consensus seems to be that the Washington meeting was an excellent first step in the right direction. And while no additional meetings between the groups are scheduled, both Chong and Raymond believe there will be more dialogue between the two groups as a result.

"[This meeting] probably actually exceeded my expectations," said Raymond. "It was an excellent beginning to what needs to be an ongoing dialogue."

"We said our peace, and they said theirs, and everybody learned something they didn't know before," said Chong. "In any first contact, that's what you want to happen."