Consumer Voice Survey On Internet Banking in India

Recently, Consumer Voice, a voluntary organization carried a survey on Internet Banking and Mobile Banking in metro and mini-metro cities of India and came up with some interesting results. The organization works for the protection of consumers under Jago Grahak Jago, with an aim to promote consumer education and awareness in India. The survey on e-banking was sponsored by Union Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Govt. of India and supported by Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and Customer Services Department, Mumbai.

The survey was conducted in 8 major cities of India, to review the quality of banking services provided by 20 leading private, foreign and public sector banks. It was seen that the usage of e-banking had increased drastically in last 5 years. While a mere 6% people used internet banking in 2005, the number has risen to 37% in 2011. The survey also showed that e-banking customers trusted private banks more, as top 4 positions based on trust were taken by private banks. However, in overall satisfaction, the public sector banks scored the highest, taking 4 out of top 5 positions.

It was also seen that only few customers changed their chief bank in the past decade. Also, 4% more customers joined a new bank as compared to those who migrated to other banks. A startling revelation was that not even one third of the customers were women and three forth of the participants were of less than 35 years of age.

One out of every 4 persons has had some problems with their banks. In fact, while there were 75% effective redressal of complaints in 2005, it jumped to 100% in 2011. The survey also showed that banks did not communicate properly with their customers. Only 50% customers were aware of the fees that their banks charged them for different services provided, while 10% were completely unaware about the fees. Similar was the case for debit cards, where around 75% consumers did not have any knowledge of the annual fee they paid for holding their card.

The credit card usage in India also has had limited outreach in last five years. The survey proves that there is lot of scope for e-banking to improve in India. The internet banking market is still very young and efforts need to be taken to make people more aware and also educate them about the pros and cons of it.