The Chief Executive of Coventry Building Society has spoken of his vision for the future after announcing the company’s annual results.

Martin Ritchley admitted that he was delighted with the direction that Coventry Building Society is currently taking but believes technology will play an increasing role in its business.

He said:

"We already have a large call centre which deals with telephone business and we have expanded this progressively over the last few years.

"We also have an Internet site but this is for information purposes only at the moment.

"The evolution I am talking about is the telephone developing so that it is an Internet operation enabling customers to be interactive so they can actually transact through the Internet.

"Now there are a number of things that we must look closely at first and we have to be very careful about security issues but we are investing in our research and development so that we can embrace this new technology."

However, the building society boss was quick to point out that these new avenues would not mean that they would be closing their branch offices.

He said:

"It is very important to point out that this is evolution and we appreciate that many of our customers, particularly the older generation, will still want to do business in the branch offices.

"We have 14 of these in Coventry alone and we will certainly not be removing that option, all we are trying to do is give our customers the choice."

Richley also believes that building societies can take advantage of the Internet far more than most businesses.