Credit where it's due

Earlier this week I popped along to see our local credit union to help them celebrate ‘International Credit Union Day’. I’ve had an account for a few years now and have just signed-up to their new online account, which for me is ideal. 

 

It was great to see the work the credit union is doing in Wolverhampton. The Chair of our Board, Sue Roberts MBE even opened her first account...I'm proud to say I signed up years ago!

Credit unions have been around for years and years – but it’s only in the last year or two where they’ve been widely talked about in the press.

Almost one million people in the UK are members of credit unions but if the concept is new to you – they’re basically a non-for-profit financial organisation, set-up to benefit the local community. There aren’t any shareholders to satisfy or make profits for, so any profit they do make goes back to its members.

If you want to know more about credit unions then take a look at Martin Lewis’s Money Saving Expert website. He’s the chap off the telly who always talks a lot sense to me!

It’s got me thinking about the financial crisis over recent years and how we all, well, most people I think, simply started to live beyond our means. Credit was being thrown around like confetti and with technology moving on at such a pace, you can see why families wanted to have the latest gadgets and gizmos. 

It feels like credit unions are the one constant in the financial sector which have been saying for years ‘use us, we’re cheaper and safer’. It makes you wonder how much financial heartache could have been spared if the credit union voice had been heard sooner?

This of course comes just a week after figures released by the homeless charity ‘Shelter’ suggest that 1 in 59 homes in Wolverhampton are under threat from repossession.

But years of bad lending, even from reputable financial organisations, as well as the alarming growth of loans sharks and pay-day loan companies means people are now struggling to make ends meet. And it’s not just people ‘feeling the pinch’, some people in our city are relying on the local food bank to get regular meals and some are at a real risk of losing their homes.

It feels like we all need to – dare I say it – get back to basics. As a society, we need to adopt the mentality of ‘I need a roof over my head, I’ll pay my rent/mortgage first and anything after that is a bonus’. But of course it’s not quite that easy.

We’ll continue to team up with the council and the CAB to help as much as we can. But perhaps our first step is making sure people know there’s an alternative to loans sharks and extortionate pay day loan; and it comes in the form of your local credit union.

At the Wolverhampton City Credit Union, more than 1,300 of our tenants have an account – as do more than 100 members of staff. It’s wonderful to see those numbers rising all the time. And with new ‘jam-jar’ budgeting accounts being launched soon, there’s never been a better time to be part of a credit union.

If you live or work in Wolverhampton then pop in and visit them – or check out their website. With Christmas fast approaching, it could be one of the more sound investments you make.

Sue Roberts is the latest of more than 1,300 local tenants to sign up to an account with the credit union