Mapping the reasons for resistance to Internet banking: A means-end approach

Although Internet banking has been widely adopted in developed countries, there is still a group of customers resisting the services. In other words, Internet banking, although proven to be a successful innovation, has still not become adopted by the laggards, and hence, has not met all the expectations of banks. Therefore, the purpose of this paper is to identify the reasons for consumer resistance to Internet banking. The special interest is to explore resistance among those bank customers who already have valid contracts for Internet banking but prefer to pay their bills via ATM. The objective is to identify those characteristics generating resistance to Internet banking and their connections to values of individuals. In order to achieve the objective, 30 Finnish bank customers were interviewed in-depth using the means-end approach and the laddering interviewing technique. The findings indicate both functional and psychological barriers arising from service-, channel-, consumer- and communication-related means-end chains inhibiting Internet banking adoption. The contribution of the paper lies in achieving a more profound understanding of consumer resistance to Internet banking, and further, in offering suggestions and practical advice for service providers’ decision-making.