The first step ahead

• New Zealand's first savings bank, the Auckland Savings Bank, opened at 7pm on Saturday, 5 June 1847.
• It was located on Queen St, Auckland.

A story of continuous innovation

• 1969: We become the first New Zealand bank to operate an online real-time computer system that links all our branches to one central computer. This means our branches are always right up to date with our customers' accounts and gives us a huge competitive advantage.
• 1984: EFTPOS appears on the New Zealand retail scene. Today, our customers make more than 10 million EFTPOS transactions a month.
• 1997: We introduce New Zealand's first internet banking site, FastNet Classic. Our customers can now enjoy the convenience of managing their own accounts online.
• 1997: We open a new bank, BankDirect. It's the first bank in New Zealand to only serve customers through ATMs, the internet or over the phone. It's an idea ahead of its time that proves to be very popular.
• 1998: We're the country's first bank to offer the convenience of weekend banking. Today, more than 20 of our branches across New Zealand open seven days a week.
• 1999: ASB Securities is the first in New Zealand to provide online sharetrading on both the Australian and New Zealand sharemarkets.
• 2003: We're the first bank in New Zealand to offer personal customers the option to stop receiving paper statements.
• 2004: We're the first major New Zealand bank to offer an online and phone-based high-interest savings account. We call it FastSaver.
• 2004: We're the first bank to implement two-factor authentication for internet banking (Netcode), adding an extra layer of online protection for our customers.
• 2006: We launch yet another New Zealand first with pago, a virtual wallet that allows users to send and receive money via text or online.
• 2006: We simplify our retail transactional banking to just three accounts.
• 2006: We launch FastNet on PDA and become the only bank in New Zealand to offer browser-based mobile banking.
• 2007: Our customers can now register for mobile phone top-ups through FastNet Classic internet banking.

ASB today

• We've now been in business for more than 160 years.
• We have over 135 branches nationwide.
• More than a million personal, business and rural customers choose to bank with us.
• We're a member of the Commonwealth Bank of Australia Group.
• Our vision is Unbeatable Team, Unbeatable Service.
• We've been rated number one in overall customer service for retail banking (major banks) 1998 - 2003, 2005, 2007 (survey not run in 2004 or 2006) University of Auckland Business School Retail Banking Customer Survey 2007.