Our Stories

Is it generally known that Bendigo Bank has mutual roots? Bendigo Bank is short for Bendigo and Adelaide Bank and formed from a merger of Bendigo Bank and Adelaide Bank. Both Bendigo and Adelaide Banks were former building societies. Adelaide Bank was formed in 1994 from a merger of the Co-operative Building Society of South…

Today we have a short interview with John Gormley of Sydney County Council Credit Union (today Australian Mutual Bank) recorded by the Association of NSW Credit Unions (ANSWCU) in 1990. John is asked about his involvement in Sydney County Council Credit Union where he attended the formation meeting in 1963 and where he initially deposited…

Hastings Rural Credit Union was registered in 1967 in the office of Hastings Cooperative in Wauchope on the Mid North Coast of NSW by the Hastings River. This beautiful part of the world is ripe ground for cooperators. They’re into it so much they bequeath money to mutuals! In 1973, the credit union moved into…

Welcome to Cuscal’s inaugural Video Line newsletter from 1996. In the words of Video Line host David Englund, “it is planned that these newsletters will be made three times a year to coincide with the major planning cycles of the credit union movement in Australia. We hope that together they will build up into a…

This week we have a video from 1986 by CUFSAL which stood for Credit Union Financial Services (Australia) Ltd. CUFSAL initially involved the Association of NSW Credit Unions, the ACT Credit Union Association Co-operative, the Credit Union Association of South Australia and the Australian Federation of Credit Unions Ltd (AFCUL). It was instituted in 1985/1986…

Resources Credit Union was formed in May 1961 when workers at the Water Conservation and Irrigation Commission in Northern Sydney agreed to form the Irrigation Commission Credit Union. After a year of operation they had 227 members. Its name was changed to Resources Credit Union in 1983 after mergers with Burroughs Employees Credit Union and…

Australian customer owned banks have been at the forefront of innovation for decades. This Cuscal/BPAY promotional video from 1998 was produced to educate Australia’s credit unions about the then brand-new payments system BPAY. We know BPAY as an online payments system, but its initial incarnation in 1997 operated via telephone. By 2007 only 24% of…

Australian Mutuals Archives was saddened to learn of the recent passing of a great friend and supporter, Gary Eggert. Gary’s long involvement with credit unions began in 1981 when he went to work for the Association of NSW Credit Unions as a management consultant. He left there to become General Manager of Transport Credit Union….

In 1986, SEC Credit Co-operative was the fastest growing credit union in Victoria. At the time it managed $106 million in assets and was owned by 30,000 members.  It was administered by 65 staff. 1986 is significant because it is the year that members voted against expanding the SEC bond. SEC stood for State Electricity…

Queensland Community Credit Union was registered in 1965 but became Australian Netherlands Credit Union in 1968 only to revert to Queensland Community Credit Union in 1995. It was begun as a way for the Dutch government to assist their citizens and expatriates in Australia with business finance. An article from the Dutch Australian Weekly of…

Mutuals pride themselves on their customer service and ethical business practices, but they also believe they are good places to work. This Cuscal video from the late 1990s shows credit union staff sharing what they like about their work – often contrasting credit unions with mainstream banks where evidentially some of them have experience. In…

Late last year we were rapt to receive a copy of the new Capricornian History by Betty Cosgrove and Jacqueline Mackay. The fantastic 75-page book was published to coincide with the Capricornians’ transition to operations as the Capricornian Bank. We are especially pleased to see the publication of the book as we assisted co-author Jacqueline…