Adoption of Internet services in the Acceding and Candidate Countries, lessons from the Internet banking case

Little is known about the dynamics of adoption of Internet services in general in the Acceding and Candidate Countries 1 (ACCs). Retail Internet banking, however, is one of the most developed e-services and, the drivers and barriers for the adoption of Internet banking are likely to be relevant to other sectors e-services. They may also shed light on the underlying supply/demand dynamics. The paper addresses the following questions: • What is the current Internet banking level of supply in the current European Union countries (EU15) and in ACCs? What are the drivers and barriers for development? • What is the current level of adoption by consumers? What are the drivers and barriers for adoption? • Are there supply/demand issues that are specific to ACCs? • What are the potential private/public policy options for addressing these issues? This paper has been based on extensive data analysis, with contributions from Internet banking experts in the EU15 and in the ACCs. Results from this research have been used to develop and validate a model of adoption factors which includes access technology and infrastructure, and sector specific retail banking aspects. This model provides a more detailed understanding of the particular challenges in the ACCs for the development of the The views expressed in this article are the author s and do not necessarily reflect those of the European Commission. * Tel.: +34-954-488-352; fax: +34-954-488-208. E-mail address: [email protected] (C. Centeno). 1 Bulgaria, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Turkey. 0736-5853/$ see front matter 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.tele.2004.02.001 294 C. Centeno / Telematics and Informatics 21 (2004) 293–315 Information Society in general, and the adoption of Internet banking in particular. Policy options to address these are also suggested. 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.