1
Obvion
Retail banking 33
Service Shops is simple. Small communities and some neighbourhoods
in urban areas are too small to enable service providers to operate a
profitable branch. By combining facilities and services into a single shop,
service providers save costs and can extend their presence in small
communities, so that the services remain available to local residents.The
Service Shop is a multifunctional desk, offering services in the fields of
banking, mail, housing, labour, healthcare and municipal services.
Electronic banking
Rabobank's website www.rabobank.nl is one of Europe's most frequented
Internet banks, with more than 1.5 million hits each month. Rabobank is
also the largest Internet bank by far in the Netherlands with almost 1.7
million clients online.Online banking is growing fast: in 2003 the num
ber of online bankers rose by more than 30%. Internet banking can be
used for payments, savings, securities transactions and insurance (the
All-in-One Policies). Clients can also monitor their mortgages via Internet.
The number of electronic payment transactions by private individuals
(via Internet, Telebanking and Rabofoon) increased sharply during the
past three years, from 37 million to 72 million. In the same period, the
proportion of electronic payment orders increased from 32% to 53%.
The increasing use of Internet banking, particularly, resulted in a sharp
decline in paper payment orders ('Forms' in graph).
Mainly as a result of the shift away from financial desk services to
electronic banking, staff numbers at the local Rabobanks fell by more
than 1,900 FTEs, a reduction of 6%.
Rabobank.be
Since November 2002, clients in Belgium can visit Rabobank.be. This
100% Internet bank focuses on the private market and offers savings
products as well as a limited number of Robeco investment funds,
among other things. Rabobank.be is the first direct-bank initiative
Obvion, a joint venture between Rabobank
and the ABP pension fund, sells mortgage
loans under its own brand via agents.
Through Obvion, the Rabobank Group is
able to acquire additional market share in
order to strengthen its market leadership
in mortgage loans.This worked well in
2003:Obvion's market share increased from
3.1% in 2002 to 4.1% in 2003. In order to
finance the fast growth in new mortgage
Payment transactions by private individuals
business, Obvion securitised more than
EUR 1.5 billion of its mortgages portfolio in
as a percentage
100
December 2003 through a public capital
80
market transaction. Bonds were issued for
60
that amount, which have been placed with
40
institutional investors in Europe.The trans
20
Forms
action was structured by Rabobank
0
Electronic channels
International.
