MONTEREY, Calif.–CUNA CEO Jim Nussle touched on three threats to credit unions he wants CU leaders to not just consider, but act on in many cases—and that includes credit unions attacking other credit unions.
In remarks to the California and Nevada leagues’ REACH Conference here, Nussle said those challenges are:
Challenge 1: The Model Threat
Opponents of credit unions want a one-size-fits-all regulatory scheme, Nussle said.
“We are different. We should be treated differently,” said Nussle. “We should be able to do our job and serve our folks. The first thing is our tax status. The banks have lost. They have lost and lost time again, particularly at the national level. So what did they do? They decided to take this state by state. The banks said let’s tax them, or let’s separate them. Those small credit unions are doing what they’re supposed to do, but those big bad credit unions aren’t. It’s divide and conquer. We have beat them time and time again and we’re going to continue to do that. We must make sure our model continues so we can continue to do the job and serve our members.”
Challenge 2: Market Attack
Nussle said it isn’t banks that should worry credit unions as much as it is a simple credit card application experience. For example, he said he recently applied for the Apple card and found the experience simple and quick to be approved.
“What scares me is it changes the experience so the expectations are changed,” said Nussle. “It takes three minutes. If at your credit union it takes a half hour and a lot of paper, that’s what we’re competing against. Let’s wring out the bad friction.”
Challenge 3: The Heart Attack
Nussle’s reference is to the heart of credit unions, the kind of attack that comes from inside.
“We cannot forget why we are different, why we put the member at center of our experience, why one of our challenges is to help people save for emergencies,” said Nussle. “As we invite people into our movement, and as they come from the banking industry, we need to remind them we are different, that we are here to help people. We want to ensure we don’t have that heart attack from within. The beauty of the movement is we are fiercely cooperative. But we are also fiercely independent, and sometimes that collides. Too many times we have credit unions competing each other. We have to stop that. I’m serious. There is a lot of blue ocean to go after. We don’t have to go after each other’s members.”