By Kait Morris
For the fourth straight review RBC Royal Bank took the top spot in overall rankings for best online banking services in Canada.
Surviscor, an Oakville firm, released the annual rankings and RBC ended up with a score of 75 out of 100..
The study, done since 2008, included detailed analysis of Canadian online banking services. The banking institutions were ranked based on their web usability in the following categories: getting started, website usability, account services, website transactions, account resources and service rates and fees.
“While the competition has closed the gap, RBC has retained the number one ranking by continuously enhancing the customer’s online banking experience, including industry leading performance in complementary account services and resources,” Glen LaCoste, president of Surviscor Inc., said in a press release.
In the same release, RBC’s Head of Digital Channels, James McGuire, said that he was very pleased RBC Royal Bank received the top spot again.
“One of our newest features that has been well received is Alerts, which give clients even more control over their finances. Clients ca now choose to receive email or text message notifications based on certain criteria they select for their accounts,” said McGuire.
RBC did take the top spot, but Scotiabank was hot on its heels with a score of 74, BMO with 71, TD Canada Trust with 70 and CIBC with 60, rounding off the top five.
“I really like RBC, I like that I can pay my bills really easily, it’s really straight forward,” said Marc Pouliot, a Broadcasting: Television and Video Production student at Canadore College in North Bay.
Most Humber students, when asked, professed to having no problems when banking online.
Jonelle James, Occupational Health student, said she had no issues banking online with both TD Canada Trust and BMO Bank of Montreal. She did, however, express a wish for them to offer a service like CIBC’s for depositing cheques.
“Even if you could take a picture of your card,” she said, noting that it would make this easier than having to type in the numbers repeatedly on smaller screens like cellphones.
Ayo Bamisile-Aje, an IT student at Humber, finds online banking with TD pretty straight forward. He did express some concerns over security, as did a number of other students on campus in wake of recent announcements of hackers and security breaches.
Amber Grassi, a Medical Laboratory Science student at the Michener Institute uses TD and is very happy with their new feature to provide custom names to your accounts.
“My mother and I share a joint account, but I was able to rename it something else in order to avoid confusion when I’m transferring money or discussing my accounts with her,” said Grassi.
Here are the top 15 banks from 2010 forward.
**feature image courtesy Flickr Creative Commons Francisco Diez