Wells Fargo Will Install Talking ATMs

Wells Fargo & Co. has agreed to provide talking ATMs in California after more than three years of negotiations with lawyers for the blind--the first time a U.S. bank has agreed to take such a step.

Wells Fargo, the second-largest bank in California, is among those that already provide Braille instructions on ATMs. But only about 15% of the blind can read Braille, and many of those who do say it still does not allow them to interact with the machines.

Coming just a day after the U.S. Supreme Court narrowed a federal disabilities rights law, the settlement is a reminder of the continuing power of both the federal law and state statutes to protect the disabled.

Under the out-of-court settlement unveiled Wednesday with the California Council of the Blind, Wells Fargo will install 20 talking ATMs with earphones next year in Los Angeles and San Diego counties and the Bay Area.

The settlement calls for talking machines at all of Wells Fargo’s 1,500 California locations by the year 2003. Lawyers for the blind believe other banks will follow.

“This should really be the beginning of a wave,” said Oakland lawyer Linda Dardarian, who represented four blind Wells Fargo customers and the California Council.

Indeed, Bank of America will begin a pilot program of talking ATMs next year, bank spokeswoman Ann DeFabio said. The bank has not yet decided where to test the machines or how many to test, she said.

Wells Fargo’s talking machines, which are still in development, will give voice instruction through headphones on how to make deposits, withdrawals and transfers, and purchase stamps. There will be one talking machine at all ATM sites, and customers will be able to choose whether to read or listen.

Dardarian and a Wells Fargo spokesman said the settlement is the first such plan to be announced. A lawsuit to force a bank in Pennsylvania to install voice-equipped automated teller machines is pending in federal court, and Royal Bank of Canada has deployed such a machine.

Larry Haeg, a Wells Fargo spokesman, refused for “competitive reasons” to disclose the cost of providing talking ATMs. If the machines succeed in California, the company will offer them to other regions around the nation, he said.

Kathy Martinez, 40, one of the blind plaintiffs in the case, said she has long been frustrated by being unable to use ATMs by herself. Blind since birth, Martinez reads Braille but says that only allows her to obtain a small amount of “quick cash.”

At times she has even resorted to asking strangers to help her at the cash machines, she said.

“It is scary,” the Bay Area resident said. “I do it as little as possible, but if I don’t have a stranger do it, I have to have my friends do it. There is a lack of privacy.”

She and other blind plaintiffs, including the Council of the Blind, decided to target Wells Fargo because they bank with the financial services company.

Catherine Skivers, president of the advocacy group, said it has not yet decided whether to pursue similar programs with other banks. She said there are more than 500,000 legally blind residents of California.

“I don’t know what we are going to do yet,” Skivers said. “We are just basking in what happened here.”

Although the talks could have ended in a lawsuit, Wells Fargo’s Haeg said the company quickly realized that talking ATMs represented a “business opportunity.”

“If there is an opportunity to earn more business and develop stronger relations with a certain segment of your customer base, why wouldn’t you want to do it?” he said.

Dardarian said her law office was pleased to reach a settlement without going to court. The talking machines will be introduced beginning next June, with locations of high customer use receiving them first, she said.

“It is pretty clear that the law--the Americans With Disabilities Act and the California Disabled Persons Act--requires equal access to ATM services,” she said. “There is no excuse for not doing it. There is not a technological barrier, and there is no undue burden that the banks can show.”

Negotiations with Wells Fargo took years to complete in part because the different parties had to evaluate various kinds of technology, Dardarian said. The technology that was eventually accepted includes earphones and a voice welcoming the customer to Wells Fargo.

The voice explains the layout of the keypad and gives instructions in how the user can make different transactions. When one is selected, the machine audibly confirms it, she said. The technology is not able to inform the user verbally of his or her balance, nor can the user communicate with the machine by voice.

The settlement also obligates Wells Fargo to make other banking information accessible to the visually impaired. Account statements, product brochures, notices, loan applications and legal disclosures will be made available by audio, in Braille, large print or computer disc, or online, Dardarian said.

She declined to disclose how much she and co-counsel Lainey Feingold will be paid for their legal work in the case, explaining that it was part of the settlement that is to be kept confidential.

“We told them we can either negotiate or file a lawsuit as an alternative,” she said, “and they said, ‘We will be happy to talk to you.’ ”