This month marked a turning point in my relationship with our business bank. Except for the odd check in a foreign currency, we’ve stopped using the teller to deposit checks.

We could use mobile remote capture, but since we walk or drive by a branch most days, it’s easier (and probably faster) to just stop by and make the deposit. But we no longer go inside to the teller line. All the Chase branches in our neighborhood have image-capture ATMs, they are rarely busy and are open 24/7.

We can feed in our usual stack of 6 or 7 checks in a minute or two, saving 4 or 5 minutes from doing it with a teller. And we walk away with a picture of the checks deposited, something you don’t get from the teller or your mobile phone. True, printed copies are redundant with the online images, but the paper records are reassuring for us and our bookkeeper.

Bottom line: I know that ATMs are enormously expensive to purchase, maintain and stock with fresh $20s. But it looks like their image-capture capability, combined with mobile remote deposit and check-image storage in online banking, has finally created a package that substantially reduces the need for the tellers they were named after.