Banks add surcharges for paying bills and for any service that involves a teller. They expect customers to wait in long lineups for less than cordial service. With five branch closures in Centretown since 1997, customers must travel further to do their banking, adding to the inconvenience. But banks may soon find they are the masters of their own demise. And newly emerging virtual banks are counting on it.
Virtual banks provide most regular banking services, but without branches.
Customers can take out loans and deposit money, but it is done by phone, Internet, or at a bank machine. The key distinction between a virtual bank and a conventional bank is that its approach to banking is very customer-centric. Virtual banks seem to actually value customers and they woo them to switch with incentives. Apparently it's not. President's Choice Financial, a Canadian virtual bank, boasts in its first year over 100,000 Canadians opened savings accounts.