eBucks.com, banking group FirstRand`s e-commerce venture, has achieved profitability eight months ahead of the group`s initial expectations.
FirstRand Bank Holdings CEO Paul Harris says eBucks.com used less than R100 million in peak funding of the R300 million set aside by the FirstRand Group.
"eBucks.com is now profitable on a month-to-month basis and is outperforming all initial expectations," he says.
eBucks.com was launched in October 2000 as the Internet banking portal for First National Bank (FNB), Origin, WesBank and Ansbacher.
Angus Brown, eBucks.com`s head of Internet banking, says more than R3.8 billion worth of transactions were processed in November and R4.2 billion worth in December. More than a million interim statements were also downloaded in each month.
"We have found that the number of transactions is growing daily," he says. "As individuals become more comfortable with Internet banking they are using it more and more, particularly to view monthly statements and make monthly payments."
Brown says the increase in uptake has put pressure on eBucks.com to improve its systems.
"In recent months FNB and eBucks.com have boosted system availability and improved response times of transactions. Independent monitoring of this performance is done every 15 minutes, with steadily improving results every month."
Investments have also been made in hardware and network capacity.
He says registration numbers more than doubled after the group announced it was scrapping the monthly subscription fees for FNB telephone and Internet banking in November.
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