A new facility that allows registered Absa Internet banking clients to open savings and investment accounts online has netted the bank 6 500 new accounts and R65 million in six weeks.
Absa Internet channel head Carl Louw says the tally comes despite an economic downturn for consumers and higher interest rates that have put a squeeze on disposable income.
"We are suddenly seeing customers starting to save, which is 'weird and wonderful' for us," he says. Louw adds that it shows customers are thinking forward.
"Literally, in six weeks, people have deposited R65 million into a facility that did not previously exist," he adds.
The bank now has over 900 000 Internet banking customers (out of about nine million in total) and Louw expects the bank to hit "the magic million mark" within the next year.
"That will be quite a rare occurrence as not that many banks around the world have a million online customers," adds Absa digital channels spokesman Dave Glazier.
The bank's figure is in line with Internet penetration figures. The Africa figure is just short of 5%, while the global figure is 22%, meaning about a fifth of the planet's 6.5 billion people have Internet access. The SA figure is about 10% - as is Absa's.
The Absa executive adds that the key to online banking today is "value-added services that make a compelling offering". The bank introduced an SMS service for transactional alerts and for checking daily balances about a year ago.
He says this was done after traffic analysis showed many customers were logging on just to check balances. "Now they can get that over their phones and they can set up a profile that allows them to choose when they want to receive balances and for what accounts," he says.
"About two million customers use this service," he says. "We are signing up masses of customers in this space, to the tune of 6 000 a day. This is phenomenal." Louw notes that Absa has 600 000 registered cellphone banking clients.
The number compares well with the US, where the entire online client base is 500 000. "So Absa, a little South African company, has more cellphone banking customers than whole of the US market of 250 million people," Louw says.
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