Carpet bagging

colshandy

I have several accounts and wondered what folks views are on keeping them going with the hope of a windfall.

I have accounts with Newcastle, Yorkshire, Leeds, Cheshire, Nationwide, Skipton, Hanlet Economic and Britannia.

Cheers

le_loup

Pointless, unless they are offering market leading rates.

CLAPTON

britannia is now part of the co-op

Hungerdunger

... and Cheshire is part of the Nationwide group.

Froggitt

Ive debagged over 100 accounts over the past year (me, missus, kids). Only one worth keeping is Nationwide.

IMHO, shut the remaining accounts, spend half the cash on loose women, fast cars and booze, and squander the other half.

The real carpetbaggers are the Building Society directors, who whilst taking hundreds of thousands of pounds a year for managing a society with just a handful of branches (is it much different to Arkwrights Corner Shop), have managed to squander a hundred years of reserves, making each society virtually worthless, as seen with the recent mergers/rescues.

I hindsight, if I and other so called carpetbaggers (and bona fide real long term investors) hadnt benefited from the demutualisations of the likes of National and Provincial, Bristol and West, Brmingham Midshires to name a few, over the past fifteen years or so, the directors would have p1ssed the cash down the toilet anyway.

Primrose

Carpet bagging is dead for good I reckon. The only reason I can see for keeping a few odd pounds in lots of different mutual building societies is in case they come up with a competitive interest offer and you've got some spare cash you want to put in them without every time have to go through the money laundering rigmarole.

50Twuncle

colshandy wrote: »

I have several accounts and wondered what folks views are on keeping them going with the hope of a windfall.

I have accounts with Newcastle, Yorkshire, Leeds, Cheshire, Nationwide, Skipton, Hanlet Economic and Britannia.

Cheers

Nationwide have already announced - at least 8 years ago - that unless someone has held an account with them since 2002 - that they will not benefit from any loss of mutuality - this (I am GLAD to say) will not allow you to benefit (unless you have held the Nationwide account for 8 years plus)

le_loup

21twinkle wrote: »

nationwide have already announced - at least 8 years ago -

1997 ...........

Froggitt

But if they do decide to demutualise, they arent going to get the 50% of disenfranchised non-owners with a signaway to vote in favour of receiving exactly nothing......hence the signaway is a total red herring......they will remove it if they want to.

50Twuncle

le_loup wrote: »

1997 ...........

Was it as long ago as that - I were just a gleam in me ma an pa's eyes back then - almost !!

alanq

Froggitt wrote: »

But if they do decide to demutualise, they arent going to get the 50% of disenfranchised non-owners with a signaway to vote in favour of receiving exactly nothing......hence the signaway is a total red herring......they will remove it if they want to.

It is my understanding that the assignment is irrevocable.

I agree that it will be almost impossible to get agreement for demutualisation unless Nationwide is in big trouble and is in need of rescuing and in those circumstances there would be no money for windfalls in any case.