Lots of retailers - the online kind and the brick-and-mortar version - have begun offering electronic receipts for purchases to help cut down on paper clutter in your wallet. So why shouldn't banks get into the act, too?
Wells Fargo & Company, which has been offering e-mail receipts at its A.T.M.'s for two years, is now offering the option to its online customers who visit its bank branches to make deposits or withdrawals with the help of a teller.
Currently, about 12 percent of all A.T.M. transactions generate an e-receipt, a bank spokeswoman, Richele Messick, said. The bank has about 12,000 A.T.M.'s and 6,000 branches. She said she wasn't aware of any other banks that offer the option.
The electronic receipt feature is available to online banking customers, who may have the receipt sent to their online banking inbox or to another personal e-mail account they designate. (The service will probably be made available eventually to all customers, even if they don't use online banking, Ms. Messick said.) When customers log into their inbox, they see an e-mail message from Wells Fargo Online titled, “Your Wells Fargo Receipt.†The message includes an electronic version of the receipt.
The bank says electronic receipts offer an added convenience for customers and helps conserve paper. “People more and more are managing their finances online, and they want to have things in one place,†Ms. Messick said.
Do you use electronic receipts? Do you find them helpful or are they hard to manage, too?
