To ease concern and educate members, Holiday Coast Credit Union is inviting its members to attend branch information forums about the merger with Regional Australia Bank.
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The credit union has 25,000 members and 98 staff.
Regional Australia Bank is customer-owned, and has 60,000 members and 200 staff. It pledges more than five per cent of its profits back into grassroots community initiatives.
Its roots are in regional NSW and its head office is in Armidale.
It's proposed that there would be no forced redundancies among any of the staff, and that the merged organisation would continue to operate both Regional Australia Bank and Holiday Coast Credit Union brands in their respective locations.
Holiday Coast Credit Union operates a branch in Laurieton on Bold Street.
The information forums are as follows:
- Monday 8 April at 5:30pm at Wauchope RSL Club Wauchope
- Tuesday 9 April at 5:30pm at Port Panthers Port Macquarie
- Monday 15 April at 5:30pm at Tuncurry Beach Bowling Club Tuncurry
- Tuesday 16 April at 5:30pm at Club Taree, Taree
Holiday Coast Credit Union CEO Neville Parsons says the merger is best for current members and their communities.
"These Forums provide a presentation of the benefits of the merger for members and their communities as well as addressing what has been the most common question around transferring to a mutual bank," Mr Parsons said.
"Regional Australia Bank is a customer-owned bank.
"It has been built upon mergers with other credit unions that have served the central to north western NSW with the initial core being New England Credit Union with its Registered Office remaining in Armidale."
He added that being a mutual bank, Regional Australia Bank is member-owned, and preserves in its Constitution the fundamental mutual value of one member, one vote.
"Like all of the customer owned financial institutions that have transitioned to mutual banks Regional Australia Bank has had great success in growing the 20 to 45 age group and is growing at better than industry rates," he said.ā