Mobile banking apps and the internet are more satisfying for customers than branch visits or phone banking

The new Roy Morgan Satisfaction with Banking Channels Report shows the CBA recording the highest customer satisfaction levels for branch visits, internet banking and mobile banking – using an app on a mobile phone or tablet among the big four banks. The report also showed mobile banking and internet banking as the service channels with the highest customer satisfaction.

As of December 2021, CBA was the strongest performer of the big four with the highest customer satisfaction across three of the service channels including mobile banking (90.8%), internet banking (87.8%) and branch banking (83.5%). The CBA had customer satisfaction of 76.3% for phone banking.

There was little to split their three competitors with ANZ coming in second overall with 89.2% (mobile), 86.6% (internet), 83.2% (branch) and 76.6% (phone). Westpac followed with 87.9% (mobile), 86.1% (internet), 82.1% (branch) and the highest of the big four for phone banking (79.4%). NAB rounded out the big four with 89.8% (mobile), 86.5% (internet), 81.5% (branch) and 77.3% (phone).

This new data comes from Roy Morgan Single Source, Australia’s most comprehensive consumer survey, derived from in-depth interviews with over 60,000 Australians each year.

Mobile banking (via a mobile or tablet app) proved to be the banking channel with the highest customer satisfaction, with an average rating among the big four banks of 89.4%. Internet banking, which is visiting a bank’s website received the second highest average satisfaction rating with 86.8%. Branch banking followed with 82.6%, and phone banking, which involves calling the bank directly, came in fourth with 77.4%.

Customer satisfaction ratings of bank service channels – December 2021

Source: Roy Morgan Single Source Australia, July - December 2021, n= 33,302. Base: Australians 14+.
1. Using an app on a mobile phone or tablet. 2. Using an institution’s website.

Mobile banking has now overtaken internet banking as the most used banking service channel

The high customer satisfaction for mobile banking is good news for the big four banks as it is increasingly the preferred way for customers to access their banking accounts – overtaking usage of internet banking for the first time during 2021.

Nearly two-thirds of Australians, 63.6%, now use mobile banking apps on a mobile phone or tablet to access their bank accounts, up 7% points on a year ago.

Internet banking, which is conducting banking through an institution’s website, remains as the second most used channel with a bare majority of 50.3% using this service, but down 9.1% points on a year ago.

Visiting a branch is clearly the third preferred service channel used by 47.4% of people, down 6.2% points on a year ago while phone banking is used by only 22.8% of people, virtually unchanged on a year ago.

Service channels used in the last 12 months – December 2021

Source: Roy Morgan Single Source Australia, July - December 2021, n= 33,302. Base: Australians 14+.
1. Using an app on a mobile phone or tablet. 2. Using an institution’s website.
Roy Morgan CEO Michele Levine says mobile banking apps continue to grow in popularity and the good news for the banks is that customer satisfaction is over 2.5% points higher for mobile banking apps than any other service channel:

“If we consider the four main banking channels available to customers it is clear mobile banking apps are increasingly the preferred channel customers are using to conduct their banking and financial transactions – especially at the expense of internet banking and visiting a branch.

“The ease of using a mobile app to check on one’s account balance and transactions means it is no surprise this is not only the most used banking service channel, but also that with the highest customer satisfaction – at an average of 89.4% for customers of the big four banks.

“For the first time in 2021 more Australians used a mobile banking app: 63.6% (up 7% points on 2020) than internet banking: 50.3% (down 9.1% points), to conduct their banking – a swing of 16.1% points on a year earlier. The rise of mobile banking apps is also coming at the expense of visiting a branch – which fell 6.2% points to 47.4%.

“The good news for the big four banks is that customer satisfaction with mobile banking apps is higher for customers of the big four banks (89.4%) than the industry average for all banks (89.0%) – the only banking service channel the big four banks have an advantage.

“Leading the way is the CBA with a customer satisfaction rating of 90.8% for its mobile banking app, just ahead of its peers including NAB (89.8%), ANZ (89.2%) and Westpac (87.9%) – with less than 3% points separating all four banks.

“The CBA also performs well when it comes to internet banking with a market leading customer satisfaction of 87.8%, and customer satisfaction with visiting a branch at 83.5%. Westpac is the best performer in terms of phone banking with a customer satisfaction rating of 79.4%.

“The higher customer satisfaction ratings of the automated banking channels give an extra incentive to banks and other financial services firms to increasingly move as many of their services online as possible.

“An added benefit for the banks of moving customers online is the reduced labour costs associated with these frictionless banking channels and it’s easy to see why the trends of recent years are set to continue with even greater technological integration and less face-to-face interaction with staff in an increasingly connected world.”

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