Life is buzzing here at HEY-CU as it’s “all hands on deck” to
provide our members with the funds they need to afford the coming festive
season. If we take a little longer than
usual to respond to your enquiries, we hope you will understand.
OUR AGM
We are looking forward to meeting our members at the AGM on Tuesday 12 December in Hull Guildhall. The meeting starts at 5.45 pm but food and drink is available from 5.15 pm. It promises to be an interesting meeting as we have lots to tell you about our action-packed year as well as our exciting plans for 2018. We promise there won’t be any long speeches but we are thrilled that Aidene Walsh of the Fairbanking Foundation is coming to say a few words about our award of a 5-star Fairbanking Mark which was obviously one of the highspots of our 2017.
Our Annual Newsletter and Report & Accounts are now
on our website for you to and we will shortly post details of the candidates
nominated for the Board of Directors so that you can read about them ahead of
the meeting if you wish. If you are
unable to come to the meeting but would like to email a question on the report,
we’ll try to have it answered at the meeting and then forward a reply to you.
RECORD CHRISTMAS SAVINGS
It’s been another record
year for our Christmas Saver account. Members accumulated just over £700,000 by
1st November, the date when the funds were unlocked for
withdrawal. All branches increased
their festive savers this year but I want to make particular mention of our
newest contact points – Howden and Hemingbrough – where, despite us only
opening in June and September respectively, the savvy-saving residents managed
to amass £4,634 towards Christmas, and earn themselves £1,450 in bonuses thanks
to our Shop the Sharks Campaign!
While browsing a
well-known bookshop the other day I was fascinated to find a paperback called Me
Sannies are Brannies by John Brien.
It lists all the words and phrases that Hull folk use that are unique to
the city, you know, like “mama mia” (here I am, mother) and “goin’ on rerd
(going shopping). It even mentioned Didlums – the informal savings clubs
often run by work mates or neighbours Hull people use to save up for
Christmas. Here at HEY-CU we must surely
be running the biggest Didlum in the City – our Christmas Saver account! It’s probably the safest one as well,
because it’s entirely protected by the Financial
Services Compensation Scheme, unlike those informal ones. If you haven’t joined yet, why not give it a
try and aim for a stress-free Christmas 2018.
I can see all you non-Hullites wondering: Me Sannies are Brannies? - My sand shoes (gym shoes) are brand new.
LOANS
GALORE
We’re very delighted that
more and more people are discovering that our Credit Union Loan offers a
great way to spread the cost whether it’s for Christmas treats, replacement
domestic items, a new car, home improvements, a holiday, a special family
celebration or whatever. Since the
morning BBC TV series featured credit unions a few weeks back, footfall in our
branches has been higher than ever, and our loans are up 35% compared to the
same period last year. Our Child Benefit Loan and Savings Plan has taken off in a big
way – check it out on our website – while, for our payroll members, our Flexi-Credit product is
proving highly popular.
During October and
November we experimented with Saturday
opening at our main Brook Street branch and there was a good response. We will be evaluating the results shortly to
see if this is something that would be worth repeating.
There’s still time to
apply for a CU Loan for Christmas but don’t leave it too long!
DRIFFIELD
CHRISTMAS FESTIVAL AND LIGHT SWITCH ON
If you’re out and about
in Driffield on Friday 1st
December the chances are you’ll meet our pennywise friend, Penny the penguin! She’ll be helping our volunteers on the
Credit Union stall at Driffield’s Christmas Market, which starts at 2 pm and
lasts until 8 pm. The festive fun takes
place in the Market Place, with the big switch on at 7 pm. There’ll be lots of
gift ideas, music and street entertainment, a family fun fair, tombola, hog
roast and a chance to see Santa on his sparkling sleigh. Talking of gift ideas, why not open a First Saver account for the
special children in your life; you’ll be setting them up for a bright financial
future?
OUR GOOLE TOY APPEAL
We’re proud to be
supporting the Our Goole
Christmas Toy Appeal, which distributes gifts to local families who need a
bit of support. Anyone wishing to donate may drop off new unwrapped gifts at
our Goole branch, 22 Pasture Road on Mondays, Tuesdays or Fridays from 10 am to
2 pm. Let’s make their Christmas a
special one.
MEMBERS’
LOTTERY
Those Credit Union Friendly Folk
who run our monthly Members’ Lottery have issued their Annual Report and
Accounts which make interesting reading.
During the year to 30 September 2017 they sold 12,371 Lottery tickets
and paid out prizes worth £7,278 (58%).
They again donated £5,000 to our Credit Union to support our training,
marketing and postage costs. We are most
grateful to the Hull Branch of UNISON,
the public service union, for becoming our main Lottery sponsor for 2017-19,
which means more prizes for our members each month.
We’re keen to find more
sponsors to help swell the prize fund.
Organisations who become Lottery sponsors get great publicity in our
newsletters, on social media and the branch TV screens, which are seen by
thousands of members. If your
organisation would like to support us, do please get in touch.
DEMENTIA
FRIENDS
Our staff team had an
interesting talk by one of the Dementia
Friends Champions, a trained volunteer from the Alzheimer’s Society. We
wanted to understand more about dementia so that we can better help members
with the condition when they visit or call us on the phone. We learnt five important things about
dementia:
·
It’s not a natural part
of ageing;
·
It’s caused by diseases
of the brain;
·
It’s not just about
losing your memory, it can affect thinking, communicating and doing everyday
tasks;
·
It is possible to live
well with dementia; and
·
There’s more to a person
than dementia. With support, people with
dementia can and do take an active role in life.
Hopefully, by becoming Dementia Friends we can play a small
part in helping to build more dementia-friendly communities. If you need support or advice about dementia,
visit alzheimers.org.uk or contact the National Dementia Helpline on 0300 222
1122. To enquire about becoming a
Dementia Friend, email dementiafriends@alzheimers.org.uk or call 0845
306 0898.
CREDIT
UNION ARCHIVE
One of our active
volunteers suggested that, now HEY-CU has passed its 18th anniversary, it could be time to set up an archive
to ensure our proud history is properly recorded for the benefit of future
generations. We are required by law to
keep minutes of our board and committee meetings of course, and we have a full
set of annual reports, but also over the years we’ve amassed a range of
artefacts such as City of Hull Credit Union mugs, pens, coasters, rulers,
shopping bags, membership cards and printed material of every kind. We’ve also won one or two awards and trophies
along the way which would look very splendid in a display case. If anyone is interested in helping us to
celebrate our history, has any expertise in this area, or any relevant items
they’d like to donate to a HEY-CU archive, do please get in touch!
TAKE FIVE
– TO STOP FRAUD
We are always anxious to
help our members to stay safe and avoid becoming victims of financial
fraud. That’s why we’re supporting Take Five – a national campaign led by Financial Fraud Action and backed by HM Government, that offers
straightforward and impartial advice to help everyone stay clear of preventable
financial fraud.
Many of us think we’d
never fall for a fraudulent text or email, but criminals are more sophisticated
than ever. Take a test to see if you can spot the fraud and know when
it’s time to say ‘My money? My info? I don’t think so’.
It’s worth remembering,
your bank, credit union or the police will never:
·
phone and ask you for
your PIN or full banking password, even by tapping them into your phone keypad;
·
ask you to withdraw money
to hand over to them for safe-keeping;
·
ask you to transfer money
to a safe account for fraud reasons, even if they say the account is in your
name;
·
send someone to your home
to collect cash, PIN, cards or cheque books if you are a victim of fraud;
·
ask you to purchase goods
using your card and then hand them over for safe-keeping.
FESTIVE
OPENING TIMES
As Santa and his helpers
prepare to make their deliveries, here at HEY-CU the seasonal work of our staff
and volunteer team will be almost done, and we’ll be ready for a little
rest. So, some of our branches will have
different opening times between 18 December and 2 January. Check out here when your branch will be
open. Our phone lines will open the same
days as Hull Central branch.
Everyone at HEY-CU sends seasonal greetings and wishes all
friends a happy, healthy and prosperous 2018.
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