January 16, 2005
The Scotsman: John Shepherd-Barron, the man credited with the invention of the ATM, faced a challenge to his title today.
Another man, Jim Goodfellow, claimed he was the true inventor behind the ATM.
Shepherd-Barron, 79, who was awarded recently awarded an OBE for his services to banking, told earlier this month how he came up with the idea of the auto-teller in the early 1960s after becoming frustrated at not being able to access his money at weekends.
In 1967, as managing director of De La Rue Instruments, he installed the world's first ATM at Barclays Bank in Enfield, north London.
But now Goodfellow, 67, claims he came up with the concept of a personal identification number, or PIN, to be typed into a keypad to retrieve money while he was an engineer in his 20s working for Glasgow company Kelvin Hughes.
Goodfellow said his patent application was submitted in May 1966 – the year before the Barclays ATM appeared.