8. Disadvantages for the bank

Although there are many benefits to the Bank running an online service, there are some downsides as well.

- Fraud is expensive. Banks lose a lot of money from fraud and online crime.

- There is a need to be always one step ahead of criminals so investment must be made in coming up with new ways to keep customer accounts secure.

- Less Customer contact and so it is harder to build personal relationships with their customers

- It is harder to sell other services to customers that may be on offer. When you see a customer in person, you can say, 'have you thought about this insurance / bank loan / service?'

- Banks have to employ specialist web developers and expensive computers to run the site.

- If the web site goes down then customers cannot access their accounts.