Bank of America may finally embrace Firefox
The largest bank in the United States has officially ignored the second most popular Web browser--until recently.
A tipster for Networkworld.com pointed out recently that Bank of America's Web site did not list the Mozilla Foundation's Firefox as a "supported browser," even though Firefox now commands almost 20 percent of the browser market. The bank's site lists Microsoft's Internet Explorer, Apple's Safari, and Netscape as acceptable browsers.
Netscape? Even AOL, Netscape's former owner, doesn't support Netscape Navigator anymore.
Of course, Firefox, which was released in 2004 and recently set a Guiness record for downloads in a 24-hour period, still works on the BofA Web site--just not officially. The issue apparently came up when a BofA customer contacted the bank about problems he was having accessing the site using Safari. "Please don't tell me to just use Firefox instead," the Networkworld.com reader told BofA customer support.
Not a problem, according to customer support.
"Please note Bank of America does not support Firefox," was customer service's reply.
When posed with the question of why the No.1 bank's Web site did not whole-heartedly embrace the No. 2 browser's 180 million users, a spokeswoman told Networkworld.com that "there is a process that we go through to 'officially support' a browser type and version, which includes in-depth functional and regression testing cycles.
"As the usage of Firefox browsers has increased with our customer base, we will be initiating a full support model for Firefox version 2.x in the very near future," spokeswoman Tara Burke told Networkworld.com.
Think "the very near future" will prove to be very soon? Don't bank on it.
Steven Musil is the night news editor at CNET News. Before joining CNET News in 2000, Steven spent 10 years at various Bay Area newspapers. E-mail Steven. 
I reiterate: how banckward
I'd rather they be a version behind and a platform short rather than supporting a version whose security conformance is not widely tested.
Readers do express their opinons. You may disagree with their opinion but I dont think anyone of us here should have a problem with a reader opining.
IE=Microsoft
IE+AOL=AOL+Microsoft
Safari=Apple
Netscape=AOL
Firefox=Open Source(No Commercial backing)
To Me, It sounds like BofA hasn't liked Open Source for some reason.
There is nothign Ironic about it at all. It sounds like a very smart strategy to me, and it has obviously served them well.
I know because I work for them and I have to leave my office and go to the public library to use the computers there.
It is not just ignoring other browsers. It is purposely programming to accept only one browser. I can't get anyone to give a good reason.
That said, I've done my on-line BoA banking via Firefox on Ubuntu for several years, and never experienced any problems. Nor do I pay fees for checking. However, I keep my *savings* with ING, since BoA's interest rates on their savings accounts are laughable.
If you want to provide a rich user interface and convenient navigation through use of advanced HTML, JavaScript and Java features (I won't talk about ActiveX controls!!) you find that your standards complaint website does not work with more than half of the browsers currently in use.
Standards-compliant browsers and standards-compliant web sites are still in a chicken versus egg situation right now, although it is improving daily.
Probably the best solution is to write such that the basic site code works immediately with standards-compliant browsers and then add switches for
known quirks of popular browsers (such as IE6.)
Writing directly to the quirks is bad design and I agree with you 100% about that. It happens most commonly when you use Microsoft Web Authoring tools.
- by mikeburek July 9, 2008 11:40 AM PDT
- They'll get to FF it after they look into that new fangled "customer service" thing other banks talk about.
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