One of the major UK mutual building societies remaining today is the Nationwide Building Society, with headquarters in Swindon, Wiltshire, South West England.

Nationwide Building Society provides financial services both directly, and through approximately 680 branches and 200 agencies. Nationwide is a major provider of both mortgages and savings in the UK, as well as personal banking and commercial lending.

Nationwide is the largest building society in the world. It has approximately 11 million members, 15 million accounts and employs 15,500 people across the UK. It is the only UK building society to clear its own cheques.

History

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• 2006
  • Ranked 3rd in the Best Big Companies to Work For list produced by The Sunday Times.
  • Assets at a record £120.6bn for the year ended 4 April 2006. Pre-tax profits of £539.4 million. http://nationwide.co.uk/about_nationwide/results_and_accounts/prelim_res_2005_2006.htm Preliminary results, NBS, 2005-06

• 2005
  • Ranked 1st in the Best Big Companies to Work For list produced by The Sunday Times and the Department of Trade and Industry.

• 2004
  • Total assets of the Nationwide Building Society exceed £100 billion (£100,000 million), making it the largest building society in the world - a position which it has held since 1997. Its asset size placed it as the 7th largest financial organisation on the UK high street.
  • Nationwide overtakes the clearing bank Barclays to become Britain's fourth largest mortgage lender, with more than 1 million mortgage customers.
  • Savings balances of Nationwide Building Society members, more than £65 billion (£65,000 million) in total, position Nationwide as the third largest savings provider in the UK.

• 2001
  • Society Carpetbaggers propose a resolution for another vote by Nationwide members to convert the society to a bank. The resolution is rejected by the Nationwide board on legal grounds.

• 2000
  • ATM surcharge campaigning in 1999 results in withdrawals from most ATMs owned by UK banks becoming free for customers of all banks and building societies throughout the UK.

• 1999
  • Nationwide Building Society, including various UK tabloid newspapers and media, lauch a campaign against controversial ATM fees. It reaches a peak when Barclays Bank announces a plan to charge all customers of rival banks and financial providers, including those of Nationwide, £1 for every ATM cash withdrawal made from a Barclays-owned ATM. This prompts Nationwide Building Society to warn Barclays that it would take legal action against the bank if it did not back down. Nationwide claims Barclays has broken the rules of the LINK network of ATMs, which the bank had joined earlier the same year.

• 1998
  • Society members seeking a windfall, branded as Carpetbaggers by the UK media, meant Nationwide members go to vote on whether to demutualise the society and float on the London Stock Exchange. The attempt fails, despite media reports of possible pay-outs to members of around £1,000 to £1,500 each, as Nationwide members vote by a narrow margin against converting the building society into a bank.

• 1991
  • The first Visa/Delta debit card in the world is launched by Nationwide Building Society.

• 1987 - Nationwide and Anglia Building Society merger.

• 1970 - Co-Operative Permanent Building Society changes its name to Nationwide and de-merges from the CWS.

Sponsorships

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The company is the former title sponsor of the Football League and current title sponsor of the Football Conference, the top level of the National League System, which governs competition in English football below the Premiership and Football League. Nationwide sponsor 2 football league teams: Swindon Town FC and Northampton Town FC (Nationwide has offices in both of these towns). Nationwide also sponsors the Northern Ireland football team.

The company is also the sponsor of the Mercury Music Prize.

Footnotes

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Subsidiary companies

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Nationwide wholly owns several subsidiary companies, namely at.home Nationwide Ltd, Nationwide International Ltd, Nationwide Trust Ltd and UCB Home Loans Corporation Ltd.

• Nationwide International Ltd, based in Douglas on the Isle of Man, provides a range of offshore savings accounts denominated in Euro, pounds Sterling and US Dollar. The accounts are designed for British expatriates but are suitable for a variety of purposes.
  • http://www.nationwideinternational.com

External link

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• http://www.nationwide.co.uk

Financial services companies of the United Kingdom