Gartner: Regular Online Banking Use Climbing

A new survey From Gartner shows that, to the surprise of no one in the financial services industry, online banking continues to grow as a mainstream access channel.

The polling of more than 2,000 adults last summer in the UK and the U.S. now finds that 33 percent of all US adults now regularly bank online – a trend less pronounced in the UK, where its 14 million or 26 percent of the British population.

“The current usage levels in both countries show that adoption is now taking place within the mainstream of consumers, among people who use new channels and services if, and only if, they see intrinsic value from the new technology,” said David Schehr, research director for Gartner’s Financial Services research team, in a statement. “Online banking has clearly made this transition in consumer minds.”

Among other key findings: online banking doesn’t result in any less branch-banking activity by customers, but is linked to higher use of ATMs and telephone banking; and online banking is acclimating customers to higher support level expectations.

Online banking is also making customers more open to emerging transactions channel – a curious finding given other recent Gartner viewpoints that predict mobile banking may become the Edsel of our era (see BTN’s Talk Back question of the week).