Quick Stats

Type – Consumer Co-operative
Founded – 1872 (1872)
Headquarters – Manchester, England, United Kingdom
Key people – Neville Richardson, Chief Executive (Co-operative Financial Services)
Industry – Financial Services
Products – Retail banking, Commercial banking and Independent Financial Advice
Revenue – £3.5 billion
Website – co-operativebank.co.uk/

Brief History

The Bank was formed in 1872 as the Loan and Deposit Department of Manchester’s Co-operative Wholesale Society, becoming the CWS Bank four years later. However, the bank did not become a registered company until 1971. In 1975, the bank became the first new member of the Committee of London Clearing Banks for 40 years. and thus able to issue its own cheques.

Since 1974 the Co-operative Bank has offered free banking for personal customers who remain in credit. It was also the first Clearing Bank to offer an interest-bearing cheque account, in 1982.

The ethical policy was introduced in 1992. In 2002, Co-operative Group Limited brought the bank and Co-operative Insurance Society under the control of a newly incorporated holding society, Co-operative Financial Services.

Membership Structure

Unlike other co-operative banks, such as the Dutch Rabobank, the Co-operative Bank does not have a federal structure of local banks, instead being a single national bank. Nor is the bank directly owned by its own members or account holders, unless they are also Co-operative Group members.

In this instance, the Cooperative Bank is wholly owned by Co-operative Financial Services, whose sole shareholder is the (member-owned) Co-operative Group. Members of the Co-operative Group are also entitled to earn dividend on their account holdings and borrowing with the Bank.

The Bank launched a separate internet-only operation known as Smile in 1999, which, according to surveys, has the highest satisfaction ratings among UK banks and has received many awards in recent years for customer service and online banking. It has around half-a-million customers. Smile bank has its call centre based at a unique pyramid building in Stockport.

On 21st January 2009, Co-operative Financial Services and Britannia Building Society agreed to a merger, with the new ‘super-mutual’ being brought under the stewardship of The Co-operative Group. The proposed merger was subject to a vote by Britannia’s members at their AGM at the end of April 2009.

On 29th April 2009 Britannia’s members voted overwhelmingly in favour of the merger.

In the short term, both Britannia Building Society and the Co-operative Financial Services will continue operating their own products, branch networks and systems.