Dover has lost one in five of its ATMs during the pandemic.

Automated teller machines in the town and across the country have been shut to help social distancing.

A new report by UK merchant payment provider Dojo has revealed the extent to which Britain’s high streets are losing their ATM’s and which UK cities are the most affected.

Dover has lost 25 autobanks, leaving 91 and meaning a decline of 21.55%.

The report found that between 2019 and 2020 the number of cash machines in Britain dropped from 62,967 to 55,674, a decrease of 7,293, with an average of over 340 machines disappearing from high streets every month. The figure for Dover's loss is in that period.

More than 340 ATMs hav been closing on the UK high street every month in the face of coronavirus.

The city of York has seen the highest rate of decline, with its number of ATMs dropping from 63 in January of 2019 to just 45 in September 2020, losing 18 machines, which is almost 29% of the city's total number prior to the pandemic.

"During the pandemic the makeup of the great British high street has changed enormously." Jon Knott

Edinburgh, ranked second with a 24% fall in the number of ATMs. London ranks third with a loss of 192 machines over that time.

Dojo, part of the Paymentsense brand, says free to use ATM machines have been declining at a faster rate than those that charge.

The data covers a span of time from January 2019, a year before the pandemic struck, to September 2020, six months after the first lockdown.

Jon Knott ,the company's head of customer insight, said: “During the course of the coronavirus pandemic, the makeup of the great British high street has changed enormously.

"While it’s long been evolving in the face of the rising of the digital marketplace, coronavirus has reaffirmed the dominance of financial technologies.

"As we’ve seen already in the press, the contactless limit could increase once again from £45 to £100, allowing people more convenience to tap for their in-store purchases.

" With more and more people opting for Apple and Google Pay which has no capped limit for contactless payments, consumers are welcoming the efficiency and speed at which they can purchase larger value products and services.

"It is no surprise then, in our digitised economy, that the use of cash is decreasing, making ATMs redundant.“

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