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History of Internet Banking

YearData
1995Royal Bank was the first Canadian bank to offer information through the World Wide Web at www.royalbank.com. Within a year, royalbank.com was receiving 7,000 to 10,000 views per week.
1996Several hundred customers were given Royal Bank’s new Managing Your Money software which linked their own PCs directly to the bank’s host computer to access a variety of services. The first national personal computer banking service in Canada, PC Banking was rolled out nationally in late 1996.
Action Direct launched PCACTION, a software package designed to provide clients with real time stock quotes and market information as well as manage their accounts – from their home or office – 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
Royal Bank added mortgage applications to its web site. Home buyers could now apply for Pre-Approved Mortgages on the Internet via www.royalbank.com.
Each month, www.royalbank.com received a million views from visitors worldwide.
Royal Bank became the first bank to offer car loan applications over the Internet. The bank teamed up with Carguide to provide car reviews, road tests, prices, and special promotions.
Royal Bank launched Internet Banking – part of a multi-channel access package offered by Royal Direct.
1997Royal Bank launched Report Direct Live which offered correspondent bank clients real-time online balance and transaction reporting via the Internet.
Royal Bank’s web site was named the “Best Canadian Business Web Site of 1996” by Net Innovations magazine.
Royal Bank launched its Year 2000 web site. Canadian financial institutions were acknowledged to be taking the lead in addressing the “Y2K bug” problem.
1998Royal Bank Action Direct introduced NetAction, an Internet trading service. Using NetAction, investors could place equity, option and mutual fund orders in real time at a discount off regular commission fees.
In alliance with AT&T Canada, Royal Bank introduced connect@work, which offered small business clients the opportunity to do their banking and business on the Internet. Royal Bank Connect@work was the first package of its kind in Canada.
Royal Bank became the first Canadian – and one of the first North American financial institutions to provide live implementation of a Secure Electronic Transaction (SET) end-to-end Internet payment solution. This gave Visa merchants and small businesses conducting business online the capability to offer consumers a highly secure payment option for Internet commerce.
Royal Bank launched a fully dedicated French-language web site at www.banqueroyale.com. It represented a first for the market: no other major financial institution – and few other organizations – offered a separate French language site.
Royal Bank acquired Security First Network Bank, the world’s first Internet bank.
1999Royal Bank signed four utilities to an electronic bill presentment pilot operated by e-route inc., a technology company jointly owned by Royal Bank and five other Canadian financial institutions. Electronic bill presentment allows clients to receive bills over the Internet.
Royal Bank and British Airways announced a major strategic alliance with the launch of British Airways Global Financial Services, which began with the Offshore Deposit Account on June 1, 1999. The alliance offered world travellers a range of international financial services – 24 hours a day, seven days a week – through toll-free telephone service and access to a secure Internet site.
Residents of Sherbrooke, Quebec, charted new territory in the virtual world as they became the first in Canada to load Mondex electronic cash onto their Royal Bank Client Cards via the Internet through a pilot program.
America Online, Inc. and Royal Bank announced a strategic alliance that featured Royal Bank’s acquisition of a 20 per cent stake in AOL Canada Inc. for US$60 million. The agreement allowed the two companies to explore co-branded and bundled services and collaborate on a range of e-commerce projects.
Royal Bank Action Direct launched NetAction 2.0, an online direct investing brokerage featuring real-time market quotes, estimated commissions, market research, news and Royal Link inter-account cash transfer service.
2000Royal Bank’s one millionth Canadian online financial services client logged on four months sooner than expected.
Royal Bank and Bank of Montreal formed Moneris Solutions to offer North American merchants simplified transaction processing for credit and debit-card purchases.
Royal Bank was recognized as “Internet Bank 2000,” the world’s top-ranked bank for e-finance, by Lafferty Research in the UK.
2001Speers & Associates ranked Royal Bank #1 in January 2001 as the top rated Canadian website and the only Canadian bank to rank as one of the top 25 institutions overall.
Royal Bank introduced a new service that allowed clients to make additional online contributions to most Royal Bank RRSP investments including Royal Mutual Funds and Savings Deposits. Added in December 2001 were additional online contributions to RRSP GICs and switching among Royal Bank RRSP investments.
Royal Bank introduced North America’s first wireless banking service for Palm handhelds, offering clients secure access to most online banking features, including account balances, funds transfer and bill payment.
e-route inc., a company owned by Royal Bank and other leading financial institutions in Canada, launched webdoxs, an electronic document presentment (EDP) service that allows consumers to receive and pay bills from participating businesses directly through their online banking accounts.
B2B Vertical Markets, a joint venture between Royal Bank and Mediagrif Interactive Technologies, invested in Net3f, an online marketplace for searching, purchasing and selling automotive parts.
Royal Bank Online Banking introduced a new service allowing clients with non-registered GIC accounts to purchase additional GICs and renew existing GICs online.
Royal Bank Action Direct launched a new online trading service that allows clients to search and identify for purchase investment products from RBC Capital Markets’ inventory of fixed income securities, (Canada’s largest), including GICs, corporate and government bonds and treasury bills.
B2B Vertical Markets invested in Viewtrak, an Edmonton-based company offering a sophisticated online facility for beef cattle producers seeking livestock data.
Royal Bank’s online customer base reached 1.9 million with more than 100,000 small businesses enrolled.
Royal Bank launched www.rbc.com, a comprehensive new corporate gateway Web site.
Royal Bank introduced an enhancement to its Online Banking service that enabled clients to move money electronically to another RBC Royal Bank personal or business client. This provided online clients with a convenient and immediate method to move funds to friends, family or between associated companies.
2002With the introduction of My View, Royal Bank was the first financial institution in Canada to provide online clients with an account aggregation feature permitting them to view, organize and manage virtually all their financial assets on one screen, including Royal Bank banking and trading accounts, as well as online deposit accounts, credit cards, investments, personal loans and residential mortgages from other financial institutions.
Two million clients were now enrolled in Online Banking.
2004Royal Bank was the first to offer Email Money Transfer under the trusted Interac brand to more than two million online banking clients. Individuals or small business clients transferred money to another financial institution in real time by sending an email message and including a secret question they created.
Royal Bank became the first major Canadian bank to give clients the ability to view cheques online through RBC Online Banking. We also introduced online stop payments.
Action Direct Online Trading service was redesigned.
2005Royal Bank clients could now choose to eliminate their paper statements and view their account activity securely online.
Royal Bank was the first Canadian financial institution to process an Interac Online transaction.
Online Banking was offered free to personal clients.
Online Banking clients were now able to digitally view ATM deposit contents and enhanced security was added with the introduction of “Sign-in Protection.”
Royal Bank’s Online Homepage was launched.
Royal Bank marked a milestone with the opening of its 3 millionth online banking account.
Royal Bank introduced guarantees for online banking and self-directed brokerage clients, offering 100 per cent reimbursement for funds lost through unauthorized transactions in their accounts.
2007Royal Bank introduced the RBC High Interest eSavings Account.
Royal Bank marked a milestone with the opening of its 4 millionth online banking account.
2008Royal Bank received the “best overall score” in the Forrester Research 2008 Canadian Banking Secure Web Site Rankings.
2009Royal Bank marked another milestone with the opening of its 5 millionth online banking account.
RBC International Remittance was introduced, providing clients with an economical and secure solution for sending money overseas.
Online Banking earned the top spot in the annual Forrester Research report.
All new Online Banking enrollments were required to set-up Personal Verification Questions as part of the use of mandatory Sign-In Protection.
Royal Bank rolled out eAssist. The program allowed clients to “chat live” with a Royal Bank representative from anywhere in the world using online chat as long as they have access to the Internet. The program also allowed “co-browsing” whereby a representative could view a client’s computer screen and provide guidance or assistance while the client is online.
RBC Direct Investing introduced real-time fund transfers. With this new capability, clients could transfer funds to and from RBC Direct Investing accounts and any RBC Royal Bank account that is connected to their client card provided that the accounts were in the same currency.
2010Royal Bank launched myFinanceTracker, Canada’s first online financial management tool integrated into an online banking system.
Royal Bank introduced a new Online Banking website.
Royal Bank launched the first fully integrated mobile banking applications for select smartphones.
2012Royal Bank captured top spot in Forrester’s 2012 North American Credit Card Online Sales Rankings.