Antecedents to Continued Usage of Internet Banking: Empirical Evidence from Australian Consumers

Abstract

The banking sector within the financial services industry is constantly responding to the consumers' preferences and needs that are changing rapidly. In a competitive financial services market place, proper anticipation and reaction to the changing needs of the customer is a requisite for the success of the retail banking. This research examines the antecedents to continued usage of Internet banking in a hierarchical order in Australian context. The decision for continued usage of internet banking by Australian consumers was hypothesized to be a function of technology, channel, social and value determinants thus controlling for the demographic characteristics. The demographic characteristics set which were not centrally of interest were examined in order to make sure that effects attributed to later sets were really not due to demographic differences with which they were correlated. Consumer decision making process, innovation diffusion and technology acceptance form the theoretical backdrop for the research. The conceptual model proposed was tested using a field experiment. Data were collected by a cross-sectional mall-intercept approach at a shopping centre from a sample of 372 internet banking users in Sydney. The data were analyzed using a hierarchical multiple regression model. The results obtained suggest that demographic characteristics and social determinants did not add significantly to the prediction of continued usage of internet banking. However, attraction to usability and attraction to trialability of the technology determinants, perceived safety and perceived specialty of the channel determinants and value determinants significantly contributed to the prediction of the continued usage of internet banking by Australian consumers.