One of the more interesting aspects of The Current Situation(tm) is that I’m having to consider things, and think through scenarios, that were heretofore not considered.

For example, a few posts back i mentioned that I decided to pull out some cash to line the gun safe with…’just in case’. Just in case of what? Well, banks runs or outright closures mostly. I was half-right…every bank in this town closed their lobbies and now it’s strictly drive-up banking.

I went to my local ATM today and when I went to select the amount to withdraw I noticed that they had upped the amounts available to $700. Hmm.

Explore this with me: As a ‘convenience’ to customers, the bank increases the amount you can withdraw to $700. Assuming that they figure people will take advantage of that, that’ll empty out an ATM faster than when the limit was the usual $350-400, right? So, and I’m guessing here because I’m not 100% of how ATM cash magazines work, the ATM’s must be packing more cash than usual in them, right? Or, at least being refilled more often than usual. Seems logical, right?

So then we see articles like this one stating that there is anticipation by some businesses that some civil disturbances may be on the way. Is it hard to imagine that the big national bank will, ‘for safety’, close down ATM’s or limit their availability (say, shutting down outdoor ATMs and leaving only ones in occupied buildings up) to preclude people robbing these flusher-than-usual ATM’s? Wells Fargo, for example, might shut down their ATM’s in the lonely drive up lanes outside their buildings to keep someone with a tow chain and a hemi from stealing it, but leave the ones in the lobby of WalMart open. That sort of thing.

Come to think of it, as people realize that you can withdraw twice as much money as usual from your ATM, I suspect robberies of ATM users will increase.

I’m sure my thoughts on this are unique and nothing is going to change in regards to ATM accessibility….but I’ve been wrong before.