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Visa falls down on promise to make ATMs fully accessible during Paralympics

September 4, 2012

Visa is once again under fire for its ATM policies at London's Olympic venues. First it was the dust-up over a Wembley Stadium POS failure during the Olympics. Now it's the complaint that Visa failed to keep a promise to provide audio service for the hearing impaired at ATMs during the Paralympics.

An article by the BBC said that the Royal National Institute of Blind People had raised the prospect of legal action against Visa under Britain's Equality Act if the company didn't add audio capability to its ATMs at Olympic venues.

In July, Visa promised the RNIB that it would add the service to two of its seven ATMs at Olympic sites. But that never happened. Visa has issued a statement saying that there simply wasn't enough time to add the software required for audio capability before the start of the games. The company insists that it has met all the requirements for accessibility by the disabled.

But according to the BBC report, RNIB began working with Visa three years prior to the games to ensure that machines would be fully accessible — including capability for audio assistance. The group is reserving the right to take action against Visa if it receives complaints from ATM users about the lack of audio service. 

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