Now apps to help you track ATMs, banks and post offices with cash

Having trouble with cash or liquidity lately due to demonetisation exercises floated by the government? Worry not, as help is around the corner.

Several app developers are working on new ways to help customers lay their hands on cash as quickly as possible and save them the trouble of looking for an ATM with cash.

One such app is the Walnut app, which was originally designed to help users track their expenses. However, via a blog post, the app developer informed users that they had made a new feature available which could help users track ATMs with cash.

Based on the ATM usage of more than 1.8 million subscribers of the app, Walnut not only points towards a functional ATM but also provides information about the length of queues at the ATM and the time it was last active.

While green pins on the map interface inside the app means that the ATMs are currently active, orange pins denote that the ATMs were recently active and grey pins means that ATMs were last active in the last few days.

"You can also help your friends and other people around you by sharing the location and queue status of a functional ATM. Every time you visit an ATM and successfully withdraw cash, we'll send you a push notification to tell us the queue status at the ATM. We've also made it simple to share information about #ATMwithCash with your friends on WhatsApp, Facebook, Twitter and other social channels," the blog post explained adding that the "more the number of Indians that use the app, the more improved the accuracy of the feature."

Walnut is not alone. Another app called Cashnocash also uses crowdsourcing mechanisms to help users track ATMs, banks and post offices with cash availability. Cashnocash, which went live on Monday, is founded by Manjunath Talwar and Abhijit Kansas and has data of over 4,000 ATMs in the country. The app-makers claim that nearly 8,000 people have already used the app.

Talwar and Kansas reportedly said that they had approached banks for data on ATMs but were declined. They also said that they were talking to companies such as Hitachi, Secure One and CMS to get more data on ATMs to help more consumers.

All the apps work mostly in the same format. When a user logs on to the website/app and searches for ATMs in a region, the result shows up a series of ATMs with cash and wait time. This helps other people logging into the app. However, there might be instances where several ATMs without information might show up as they might not have been used so far.

Another such app is CMS' own app named CMS ATM Finder. The Finder app provides information on ATMs managed by CMS. The site lets you choose your state and city and the list shows ATMs that are up and running. The site also allows the option to notify CMS if a particular ATM is shut or out of cash. CMS says if it is notified about an ATM not functioning or has run out of cash, it will take action quickly.