EastWest Bank guns for best website anew

EastWest Banking Corp. tries to replicate its victory last year as it again vies for the best website in the Banking and Finance category of the 2005 Philippine Web Awards.

The award, considered the "Famas" of the Internet, honors the country’s best websites across 14 different sectors of the society annually. This year, the award carries the theme "Festivals & Fiestas."

EastWest Bank’s joining the award, its fourth to date, is a fitting celebration of its many milestones in information technology.

In 2004, only on its third try, the bank won the Best Website Award in the Banking and Finance category over other serious contenders.

EastWest Bank’s website (www.eastwestbanker.com) boasts of colorful, fully functional and user-friendly pages. It is easy to navigate and contains information that is of value to depositors, suppliers and all other users of the website.

The website features NetAccess, in which depositors are able to do a host of basic banking transactions such as balance inquiry, funds transfer, bills payment and checkbook reorder.

This feature is the bank’s "out-of-the-box" banking philosophy at work, in which the bank promotes alternative options in banking using advances in information technology.

Last year, the website posted 4.9 million hits, which were a record of the actual bank transactions.

EastWest Bank’s IT team led by first vice president for IT Karl Reyes is at work all year-round, sprucing up the website with their creative inputs to make it always fresh, attractive and useful.

In this year’s contest, EastWest Bank is up against three other contenders in the Banking and Finance category.

A total of 106 websites, including that of EastWest Bank, made it to this year’s list of semi-finalists.

Besides the Best Website Award, EastWest Bank’s website also has the chance to be this year’s People’s Choice and Most Popular Website.

Voting can be done through SMS or online. For details on how to vote, log on to www.philippinewebawards.com or type WEBBYS<space>VOTE<space>7 and send to 2973 for Globe and Touch Mobile or 283 for Smart and Talk and Text.

Awarding will be held on Nov. 25 at Meralco Theater in Pasig City.