Absa wins international award for best consumer internet bank

"It is a privilege to be part of such a distinguished group of banks in the Africa and Middle East region. Also, being only one of two winning banks in this category based on the African continent, reaffirms our drive to continuously bring innovative digital solutions to our customers," said Christo Vrey, managing executive of Absa Digital and Self Service Channels. "As South Africa's appetite grows for Internet and mobile-based banking, we are confident that we will have the necessary skills to evolve with the changing digital landscape in the country."

International judges

The winners were selected by a world-class judging panel and were evaluated according to their strength of strategy for attracting and servicing online customers, their success in getting customers to use their web offerings, growth of online customers, range of product offerings, evidence of tangible benefits gained from Internet initiatives as well as web site design and functionality.

Absa has over a million online customers who interact with the organisation on a regular basis via its internet-banking platform. In addition, it has registered two million cellphone banking customers across its various cellphone banking platforms, such as unstructured supplementary services data (USSD), wireless internet gateway (WIG) and wireless application protocol (WAP).

"We operate in a very robust and ever-changing environment which demands that we provide our customers with the appropriate digital solutions that complement their lifestyles and financial requirements," continues Very.

"The digital banking environment has undergone a tremendous metamorphosis over the last decade and, as we move more towards becoming a 24-hour society, financial institutions such as us will have to meet the demands of the changing needs of the community with complementary product and service offerings," he concluded.