WHAT IS A CREDIT UNION?

A credit union is a group of people who save together and lend to each other at a fair and reasonable rate of interest. Credit unions offer members the chance to have control over their own finances by making their own savings work for them.

Regular savings form a common pool of money, which in turn provides many benefits for members.

WHERE TO FROM HERE?

Proposals are in the pipeline to restructure the Credit Union movement in order to enable us to provide full banking services to our members. This would entail providing Credit Unions with sort codes and access to the clearing system. European recommendation are that cheques be phased out as a form of currency by 2018 and should this happen then the way many of us do our financial business will change dramatically. Credit Unions need to move with the times but doing so and retaining our community identity and cooperative nature is a very big challenge indeed.

WHAT ARE THE BENEFITS OF A CREDIT UNION?

A credit union is an organisation of people – for people. It exists only to serve its members – not to profit from their needs. Credit unions are non-sectarian and non-political, and continue that Irish tradition of co-operative self help.

In Ireland over 2.9 million members have recognised the value of credit unions and have savings approaching €11.9 billion. There are over 9,200 active volunteers involved in the movement, and over 3,500 people are employed.

Kiltimagh Credit Union has 3750 members with €13 million in savings and over €7 million in loans.

It has been shown throughout history that by working together people can achieve far more through co-operation than by individual effort. The success of the credit union movements worldwide is a clear illustration of this. Credit unions have served their members well in Ireland, and as long as there are active members, they will continue to do so.