ATM card

A bank or other financial institution (e.g., a credit union) may issue an ATM card to its customers to enable them to access their financial accounts through its or others' automated teller machines (ATMs), as well as to make approved point of purchase retail transactions at participating merchant locations (i.e. gas stations, grocery, hardware, department stores, etc.) In contrast to credit cards and debit cards, ATM cards are not accepted as payment methods. ATM cards are plastic cards in the size and design of a payment card, with a magnetic stripe and/or a plastic smart card with a chip that includes a unique card number as well as certain security information, such as an expiry date or CVVC (Card Verification Value) (CVV). An ATM card is known by many other names, including bank card, MAC (money access card), client card, key card, and cash card, to mention a few. In addition to debit and credit cards, there are a variety of other payment cards that may serve as ATM cards. Charge and proprietary cards are not permitted to be used as ATM debit cards. The use of a credit card to withdraw cash from an ATM is considered differently from the use of a credit card to make a purchase in a store, with interest charges often accruing from the date of the cash withdrawal until the account is settled. Using ATM cards at ATMs operated by commercial companies and financial institutions, rather than those operated by the institution that issued the card, is possible thanks to the interbank networks.

As an alternative to traditional ATMs, ATM cards may be used on makeshift machines such as "micro ATMs," which are merchant card terminals that provide ATM functionality without the need for a cash drawer. They may also be utilised as cashless scrip ATMs if the receipts issued by the terminals are cashed at the time of sale by the merchant.

Bank of America (Barclays) in London was the first to offer ATM cards in 1967.