ATM practice: a pretend cash machine to press the keys on

A real cash machine

• Machines differ a great deal. Some have a touch screen, some have buttons beside the screen, and the words and the order of the screens change from one to the next. What follows is how it often goes, not how any one machine works.
• The card. Some machines pull the card in and hold it until the end. Some ask for it to be pushed in and pulled straight out. Some let a card be tapped. A picture near the slot often shows which way the card faces.
• The PIN is the private number that goes with the card, often four digits. The screen shows a dot or a star for each digit. Many people cover the keys with the other hand while they type it.
• Three keys with names. Many machines have a key that takes back what was typed (often yellow, “Clear”), a key that says “that is all of it” (often green, “Enter” or “OK”) and a key that stops everything and gives the card back (often red, “Cancel”).
• Checking or savings. Many machines ask which account. A card that goes with only one account may work with either answer on some machines and not on others; the bank or the office that gave the card can say which.
• Bills, not coins. Many machines give only $20 bills, so the amount has to be one that $20 bills can make. Some machines give other bills too, and say so on the screen.
• The fee screen. A machine that does not belong to the card’s own bank often charges a fee. In the U.S. such a machine shows the fee on its screen and asks before going on; answering no stops there, and the cash stays in the machine. The card’s own bank may add a fee of its own, which the machine does not show.
• Take everything. The card, the cash and the receipt come out of different places, not always in the same order. Many machines beep until the card is taken, and many pull the cash back in if it sits there a while.
• A PIN that does not match can be typed again. After a few misses in a row, many banks lock the card, and some machines keep it. The bank or the office that gave the card is the one that can undo that.
• Nobody honest asks for a PIN. A caller, a text, an email or a stranger near the machine who asks for the PIN, or offers to “help” by taking the card, is something to be careful with: Is this a scam?
• When something looks off. If part of the card slot or the keys looks loose, added on or out of place, or someone is standing too close, another machine is the calmer choice.
• When the machine slips, keeps the card or gives an amount that is not the one asked for, the phone number on the back of the card, or on the machine, is where to say so, and sooner is better. A receipt helps.

How the lessons work

• The pretend machine is the dark box. The blue part at its top is its screen: it shows what the machine is asking, and its choices are buttons on the screen itself.
• The pretend card is the box with the dashed edge. It shows a made-up PIN, a new one for each lesson. On a real card the PIN is not printed; it is in your head.
• “Put the card in” stands for the card slot. While the machine holds the card, the same button says “Take the card”. “Take the cash” and “Take the receipt” show up when there is something to take.
• The keys are pressed with a mouse, a finger, or the Tab and Enter keys. While the pretend machine is in use, the number keys of a real keyboard press the number keys too. “Cancel”, “Clear” and “Enter” are pressed on the page.
• The PIN shows as dots as it is typed, as on a real machine.
• The yellow line under the machine says what the last press did, and what the machine is waiting for.
• A choice the step is not after changes nothing: the machine stays on the same screen and the yellow line says so. A real machine would go on with that choice.
• “Cancel” in the middle of a step stops the pretend visit, gives the card back and puts the step back at its start.
• The pretend machine does not count misses. A PIN that does not match can be typed again as many times as it takes.
• “Next step” answers only when the step is done. Until then it is gray. On the last step of a lesson it says “Finish the lesson”.
• The page waits. There is no countdown, and nothing is timed or counted. “Start this lesson again” asks for another card, other amounts and another order of choices.

Every time the page is built, a program makes 24,000 lessons, half in English and half in Spanish, and walks through their 60,000 steps, pressing the keys itself: that the choice a step is after is on the screen, that no step is done before it begins, that the right presses in order end the step, that every other key and every other choice leaves the machine where it is, that a PIN with a digit off or a digit missing is not taken, that a typed PIN shows only as dots, that an amount $20 bills cannot make is not taken, that the fee is on the screen before any cash comes out, that “Cancel” puts the step back at its start, that the card that went in comes back out, and that both languages ask for the same presses.

What this page does not do

• It moves no money and reaches no bank. It cannot show a real balance.
• It is not any real machine. A real machine’s screens, words, order and fees will be different, and so will its buttons.
• It does not practice putting money in, moving money between accounts, a machine that talks through a headphone jack, or paying at a store’s card reader. Those choices are on the pretend screen only to be read past.
• It does not know the fees, the daily limits or the rules of any bank, card or benefits program. The bank or the office that gave the card is where to ask.
• It cannot practice the hands: which way a card faces, how hard to push it, where the cash comes out, the glare on a screen outdoors.
• It has not been tried by people. A program tried the page with a mouse and a keyboard in one browser. It has not been tried on a touch screen, with a screen reader, a switch or an eye tracker.
• It keeps no record of lessons done, gives no certificate and makes no promise about how any real machine will go.