PayThink

Welcome to 2008. Let me be the first to also say, “Happy 100th Birthday, U.S. Credit Union Community!” Let me also be the first to say, “Happy 99th Birthday, U.S. Credit Union Community,” as I like to cover my bases.

As I was leaving a board meeting on a fall afternoon in Northeast Ohio, I cut through a colleague’s office and exchanged pleasantries. “How’s your family? How are things going?” She said her headache from the morning had finally subsided–it began when a credit union member starting yelling at her on the phone.

Credit unions often misapply marketing resources because they don’t understand the youth market. Since “youth” ranges from newborns to those in their early 20s, it’s a wide audience with significant differences in product usage, interest and financial institution awareness. Only when the needs of each age group are analyzed can marketing entice youths or their parents to open accounts.

In honor of the Credit Union Journal’s 10th anniversary I collected the top 10 reasons I believe the credit union industry has the opportunity to grow and prosper in the coming decade. It turns out that the evolution of credit unions as service oriented financial services providers with strong community ties has positioned credit unions for success in our rapidly changing culture. Of course we need to educate the marketplace on what sets credit unions apart and deliver on our service promises to live up to our potential.

It’s a curse and it could be far worse–but it’s a tradition nonetheless,

An unhappy systems administrator who may want to teach a seemingly unappreciative credit union a lesson. An employee who is passed over for a promotion or a raise. A technically savvy database administrator who, for the right price, is willing to change someone’s credit history so they will be approved for a loan.

Much focus has been placed on Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson’s misguided plan to bail out subprime ARM borrowers facing initial resets. But not much has been said about the “Mortgage Forgiveness Debt Relief Act” (H.R. 3648), which would eliminate the taxation of losses on foreclosed homes as ordinary income. Under the existing tax code, a homeowner whose home is foreclosed and sold at a loss is liable for income tax on the loss, presumably to offset the tax break the lender will get.

Now that the benefits of online banking are well understood to most computer-savvy banking consumers, what’s the next step in banking convenience?

Despite the omnipresence of webcams, one eternal question remains unanswered: if a tree falls in the forest and no one is there to hear it, does it make noise? We may never know. What we do know, however, is that if a credit union name tied to the forest falls, it can make a great deal of noise. Just ask the former Weyerhaeuser Employees Credit Union in Longview, Wash.

WASHINGTON - CUNA last week called for a moratorium on implementation of certain provisions of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006. In a letter to House Financial Services Committee Chairman Barney Frank (D-MA), CUNA President Dan Mica said the trade group has concerns over the pending implementation plan issued by the Treasury Department and Federal Reserve Board. While saying it supports the law’s intent on cracking down on illegal online gambling, Mica wrote that credit unions are also concerned over “unforeseen regulatory burdens” on credit unions and other financial institutions.