What this occupation does
Bank tellers (the BLS occupation title is Tellers, SOC 43-3071) receive and pay out money, record customer transactions, cash cheques, and handle routine account activity at bank and credit-union branches. The role spans deposit and withdrawal processing, cash handling and drawer balancing, cheque verification, and frontline customer service, including referring customers to other bank products and staff.
The exposure score in context
The ILO 2025 refined Generative AI Occupational Exposure Index places bank tellers in the very high exposure gradient. ILO 2025 places bank tellers in the very-high exposure gradient: the core deposit, withdrawal, cash-handling, and transaction-recording tasks are routine financial-clerical work of the kind most exposed to automation and generative AI. What is less exposed is the frontline judgement in fraud and exception cases and the customer-relationship and referral work that banks increasingly ask branch staff to lead.
The mapping uses ISCO-08 code 4211 (BLS-published SOC-to-ISCO crosswalk). The full methodology, including the dominant-match rule for one-to-many crosswalks, is at /methodology/#algorithm.
The top five tasks, classified
The top five O*NET 30.2 tasks for this occupation, each tagged Displaceable / Changing / Growing per the Brookings 2024 task-level rubric. The tag definitions are at /glossary/#displaceable-task, /glossary/#changing-task, and /glossary/#growing-task.
- Displaceable: Receive checks and cash for deposit, verify amounts, and check accuracy of deposit slips. Deposit capture and amount verification are directly served by ATMs, mobile-deposit apps, and automated cheque-reading; this is among the most-exposed teller tasks.
- Displaceable: Cash checks and pay out money after verifying that signatures are correct, that written and numerical amounts agree, and that accounts have sufficient funds. Balance checks, signature matching, and cash dispensing are automated at ATMs and teller-assist machines for the routine cases.
- Displaceable: Enter customers' transactions into computers to record transactions and issue computer-generated receipts. Transaction keying and receipt generation are core routine clerical steps that self-service and automated channels replace directly.
- Changing: Balance currency, coin, and checks in cash drawers at ends of shifts and calculate daily transactions, using computers, calculators, or adding machines. Cash-recycling machines and automated reconciliation handle routine drawer balancing; judgement on discrepancies and cash-flow exceptions remains human.
- Changing: Examine checks for endorsements and to verify other information, such as dates, bank names, identification of the persons receiving payments, and the legality of the documents. Automated fraud and document checks flag routine issues, but adjudicating suspicious cases and applying know-your-customer judgement stays with staff.
What is growing in this role
The BLS Employment Projections 2024-2034 outlook for bank tellers is decline (-13% projected change, no published absolute figure). Source: BLS Employment Projections 2024-2034.
Per the WEF Future of Jobs Report 2025, the top three growing skills relevant to this role are: AI and big data, Technological literacy, Empathy and active listening. The skills are mapped to the occupation's O*NET skills profile.
Brookings 2024 places routine transaction processing among the most-exposed clerical work. For tellers the augmentation-prone residue is narrow but real: complex customer problem-solving, fraud and exception judgement, and the relationship and product-referral work banks are shifting onto branch staff as routine transactions move to self-service.
Bank Tellers in the WEF Future of Jobs Report 2025
Bank tellers and related clerks are the second-fastest-declining role in the WEF Future of Jobs Report 2025, projected to fall about 31% by 2030 as online and mobile banking reduce branch visits. The WEF global proportional decline (~31% to 2030) and the BLS US projection (-13% to 2034) both point down; BLS attributes the fall to fewer bank branches and greater in-branch automation, while still projecting about 29,800 openings a year to replace departing workers. Source: World Economic Forum, Future of Jobs Report 2025 (January 2025). The WEF lists are occupation-family level and global, ranked by change to 2030; they are distinct from the BLS 2024-2034 US projection above. The full named declining and growing lists are on what is growing.
Similar occupations
O*NET 30.2 lists the following related roles. Each links to its own deep dive where one is published.
- Cashiers
- Bookkeeping, Accounting, and Auditing Clerks
- Customer Service Representatives
- Administrative Assistants
- Insurance Underwriters
Industry context
This role sits primarily in the Finance industry. The industry-level rollup includes the cross-occupation exposure profile and the BLS-published industry-level outlook.
How this assessment was made
The full methodology is at /methodology/: ILO 2025 refined index for the gradient, Brookings 2024 rubric for the task tags, BLS 2024-2034 for the growth outlook, WEF 2025 for the skills demand. The pre-empted critiques are at /how-to-argue-with-this/.