[tomchuk]

Nail on the head. I can only remember one or two occasions where I've needed to copy a key and waiting a couple days for delivery would have been practical.

That said, I had a clever idea on my way to work this morning.

They've already got automated kiosks[1] all over the place, why not network those, give customers a login and let them save their keys to a centralized location. You'd then be able to get a copy of any of your keys without having the original present. You could even share keys with another account - visiting friend, whatever, so they can get a copy cut in their hometown. No need to save any info besides login credentials and keys (ie. nothing that could allow someone to trace a key back to a lock via a billing address).

[1] http://www.minutekey.com/