Chapter 1376 - The Perfect Combo
The item underneath the cloth was finally unveiled right before everyone's eyes.
Whoosh!
It was a very strange-looking and big machine that still caused waves of confusion for them.
Dionne gazed at it deeply, suddenly getting enlightened.
"Your majesty, could this thing be similar to the money-changing machines all around Baymard?"
"Well, not quite."
"Eh?"
Now, many were still even more confused than before.
Landon chuckled, seeing them struggle to make heads or tails of the situation.
"For A.T.M's, you can think of them as money dispensing machines, very different from currency exchange machines.
In these machines, you will need to input your card. But in the latter, you input money to get it back in a different currency or a different form of the same currency."
On the ships, the currency exchange machines can change silver coins into smaller bits of copper coins for those leaving Baymard.
And for those arriving who already have a good understanding of Baymard, they would use the specific machines that change coins into a few Bays.
Likewise, there are machines around Baymard and aboard the ships that also change big Bays like the 100-Bay paper into smaller Bays like 25s, 10s, 5s, 1s.
In the end, all these machines scattered around worked on the vending machine principle.
But ATMs didn't.
Landon clasped his hands, moving towards the machine.
"Ladies... Gentlemen... Please gather around and let me explain."
Say no more.
They had long wanted to move closer and see the machine rather than stretching their necks like ducks.
"Everyone, some of you might notice that you have very different prominent colored cards, either blue or gray.
The blue represents what I'd like to call a debit card, and the gray represents a credit card.
Subconsciously, everyone peeked at the cards in their hands thoughtfully. .though there were many strange coloured logos/symbols on them; the most prominent color would be the card's base color.
Dionne narrowed his eyes profoundly.
Debit cards... Credit cards...
He still wanted to know more about them.
.
With everyone's attention piqued, Landon decided to give a very brief explanation to it all.
"As I said, this machine is an Automated Teller Machine, which can do a variety of jobs and basic operations that tellers do.
Typically, the ATMs would be connected to the bank's systems, recording and monitoring all actions that occurred to a customer's account.
However, with these sample cards, today's visual representation will show no accounts." Landon cautioned.
Well, the internet had already been up and running. And as soon as he finished that meeting with Tim a while back, the specific industry tasked with connecting several establishments with the internet was quickly dispatched to the bank.
He had waited for them to finish up before this meeting began.
Over a year and a half, they had long been building internet towers and connecting cables all around Baymard for the day when both wireless and wired Internet would finally be available.
Thus, with the emergence of computers, how can there be no internet?
Anyway, the team he had down at the lower region should now be seated by the computers, monitoring that whatever he did worked.
After all, he was using sample cards on this specific machine tester.
The other ATMs around the building were official ones for official use. But this one wasn't.
.
Pap.
Landon inserted his card, and everyone's eyes bulged, almost coming out of their sockets.
"Look! It's asking his majesty to insert a pin. Bravo! Bravo! This way, security will be kept in place!"
"Quickly! Take a look at the screen. There are 4 main boxes highlighted: Deposit, Withdraw, Account Balance, Transfer."
"Amazing! After opening the deposit tab, the money his majesty sent in was added to his account after checking the balance. And in the end, there's even an option to print a receipt... So does that mean that there's a printer inside?"
"This is good! Do you know how many people line up for hours to deposit money? Imagine these A.T.Ms scattered all over Baymard. Think about it. The banks will no longer be saturated!"
"Exactly! And to make matters better, look at tye 'transfer' situation. When he clicks on the transfer tab, it's merely a tab for those with 2 or more accounts. Let me tell you that as someone with 3 bank accounts, this is a dream to be. Hahahahahaha~... No more standing in line for simple money transfers from one account to another."
"That's right. Even depositing money and checking one's accounts balance can be done with the simple use of the cards. Tsk! No wonder his majesty said that the cards would replace physical money."
Dionne shook his head thoughtfully: "Not quite. Though these are all good, it's still far from enough to replace physical money. Think about it... The cards seemed to be only usable in the banks... So why should many mean towards them?"
Landon grinned, listening to everyone's thoughts.
For now, they still didn't see the whole picture, thinking that cards must only be used in the bank.
Whoosh!
Brian appeared beside Landon, opening up what seemed like a large sealed envelope.
And in it was what many modern people would recognize.
Sigh... As expected.
This was the complete package to the card and A.T.M combo.
Yup!
He was talking about a Point-Of-Sale (POS) machine.
That's right.
He was talking about the card machines that taxi drivers, superstores, cafes, restaurants and every other store in modern times used when a person wanted to purchase an item.
You know the drill... Insert your card, tip or not, type your pin and punch the enter button.
This machine was the baby that made the trio combo work.
Though he introduced the A.T.M and Card system, he planned to make it public a month after the internet and computers became public in May.
Meaning by late June or early July, he expected the bank to finally make things known once they were fully ready to go!