The rate of electronic banking usage in Vietnam is increasing sharply.

The number of people using banking websites in Southeast Asia has surged over the past year, as banks become more internet-savvy and customers get used to paying bills online.

The results of a survey conducted by comScore released on March 9 showed that the number of visitors to banking websites increased by double digits in the past 12 months since January 2010 in all six countries surveyed by the market research firm, with Indonesia having the highest increase of 72%.

Illustration photo: Internet

“Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines have the highest annual growth rates as banks today better provide these online services,” said Joe Nguyen, vice president of comScore Southeast Asia.

The number of online banking users in Vietnam increased 35% from 701,000 to 949,000 over the past year. Meanwhile, the number of users in Indonesia increased from 435,000 in January 2010 to 749,000 a year later. The number in the Philippines increased 39% from 377,000 to 525,000.

Despite these impressive growth rates, Mr. Nguyen said that all three of these less developed markets still have relatively low usage levels relative to their populations, so there is still room for strong growth.

“We have seen online banking really take off as people can start paying their utility bills online, so we expect that to grow as those services develop in Vietnam, the Philippines and Indonesia,” he said.

According to the survey results conducted in Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia, Philippines, Hong Kong and Singapore, Malaysia is the country with the largest number of customers using online banking services with 2.7 million people in January 2011, an increase of 16% from 2.4 million.

Hong Kong came in second with an 18% increase in users from 1.3 million to 1.5 million over the past year. Singapore followed with 889,000 visitors in January 2011 compared to 779,000 visitors in the same period last year, a 14% increase.

According to Vietnam+