Portman/Nationwide merger - membership rights

MarkyMarkD

D'oh! You are quite right - it's the sign away Nationwide account which is the problem here. So you can keep your £200, close your useless Nationwide sign away account, and then get full Nationwide membership. Well done, Compound.

Chadsman

The merger documents say to the effect membership of the merged Society will be backdated for Portman members to when they first joined the Portman.
It is my interpretation of this that you will be deemed to have been a member of the new Society from when you joined the Portman (or in my case Staffs or Lambeth or Greenwich or...) including for the purposes of the charity clause.
...but as others have said this is really only of academic interest since the charity clause will never be invoked.

PS: does anyone know how many angels can dance on the head of a pin?

Kilty_2

The Nationwide "sign away" will be scrapped in order for them to demutualise if it ever comes to light anyway, so it's nothing to worry about at all.

Compound_2

The ‘it won’t make a difference’ argument would be supporting the directors who don’t want to give attention to the robbing of Portman members’ windfall rights and the theoretical argument in favour of closing accounts. Funds leaving Nationwide are unlikely to return after the merger. The signaway customers are genuine savers, whereas many Portman accounts will be £100 carpetbaggers.

From a MoneySaving point of view, the merger should be a wake-up call to move your money from Nationwide to the top payer. This would also be a protest which punishes the Society for this abysmal deal.

MarkyMarkD

Chadsman wrote: »

The merger documents say to the effect membership of the merged Society will be backdated for Portman members to when they first joined the Portman.
It is my interpretation of this that you will be deemed to have been a member of the new Society from when you joined the Portman (or in my case Staffs or Lambeth or Greenwich or...) including for the purposes of the charity clause.

Whilst your understanding would be the sensible one, it isn't what was stated at the AGM.

The point is that if you've signed a Nationwide sign away, that has signed away all rights you might ever earn to a Nationwide payout. So getting "full" membership through having a Portman "full membership" account doesn't help - you are in fact already a Nationwide member, but one whose given their rights away. That doesn't change.

bristolleedsfan

Compound wrote: »

The ‘it won’t make a difference’ argument would be supporting the directors who don’t want to give attention to the robbing of Portman members’ windfall rights and the theoretical argument in favour of closing accounts. Funds leaving Nationwide are unlikely to return after the merger. The signaway customers are genuine savers, whereas many Portman accounts will be £100 carpetbaggers.

From a MoneySaving point of view, the merger should be a wake-up call to move your money from Nationwide to the top payer. This would also be a protest which punishes the Society for this abysmal deal.

the "it doesnt make any difference" remark is based on apparent fact that due to signaway being in operation for 10 years together with apparent fact that a proportion of non signaway nationwide members wouldnt have 100.00 in their accounts at a specific time of any announcement, nationwide would have to scrap the signaway in order to get any vote through ( irrespective of ex portman members status) as for "wake up call" i closed my original longstanding monthly saver with nationwide ( bonus saver) when that account went mediocre and not long after nationwide took steps to protect itself from forced conversion attempts its invest direct account also soon became mediocre so for not far off 10 years ive voted with my feet by just keeping 100.00 in nationwide savings account

with reference to portmans "100.00 carpet baggers", moving their money out they will also have long standing nationwide accounts anyway

Milarky

MarkyMarkD wrote: »

Whilst your understanding would be the sensible one, it isn't what was stated at the AGM.

The point is that if you've signed a Nationwide sign away, that has signed away all rights you might ever earn to a Nationwide payout. So getting "full" membership through having a Portman "full membership" account doesn't help - you are in fact already a Nationwide member, but one whose given their rights away. That doesn't change.

Are you relying on the Terms for Portman members or the more tightly drafted Nationwide Charitable Assignment (for all members)? And what does this 'two years after leaving' mean then? Does that not mean you could leave Nationwide as a Portman member before merger and, after two years, you would not be bound by the original Nationwide Charitable Assignment which you did sign?

Chadsman

Has anyone from either society ever unambiguously stated what the position will be postmerger?

Compound_2

bristolleedsfan: You are assuming the building society membership votes rationally, but there is no evidence for this. On the contrary, the membership generally act as sheep and rubber-stamp the Board’s recommendations. Hence the fat cat remuneration policies, and the cheap sale of Portman, go through with over 90% in favour. If the Board recommended that conversion would be best for Nationwide, they might get the required majority without waiving the signway.

Milarky: Windfall payments become due immediately after demutualization, i.e. after membership of the Society ends. So the two-year reference stops you getting such windfalls. I would interpret the clause in relation to closed accounts as you have done.

Chadsman: This is a matter of law so only a court can give a definitive interpretation. Anything the Societies say could be wrong. However, I believe interpretations in this thread are the proper ones, which the Societies do not wish to give attention to for the reasons I mentioned.

MarkyMarkD

Milarky wrote: »

Are you relying on the Terms for Portman members or the more tightly drafted Nationwide Charitable Assignment (for all members)? And what does this 'two years after leaving' mean then? Does that not mean you could leave Nationwide as a Portman member before merger and, after two years, you would not be bound by the original Nationwide Charitable Assignment which you did sign?

I don't think that leaving Nationwide (sign away) membership pre merger will work, having read that. Because there won't be a 2 year gap in membership - you'd lose sign away membership and then regain membership well within the 2 years so the sign away would still apply IMHO.