So, does anyone have any opinions about the proposed mergers of Westoba, Assiniboine and Caisse Financial Group?
First off, an article:
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/credit-union-manitoba-merge-1.7179651
In my opinion, Westoba's service has been really declining in the past two to three years. ATMs out of service is one issue (ran into this today, in fact!). The complete lack of ATM access at 2:30pm on a weekday downtown is another. Though this may have changed, I was on foot around a month ago and found no ATM at the Westoba building and a closed atrium containing the other credit union's ATM down on Rosser. Meanwhile, I had to walk past 2 big banks which were happily open and doing business. Needless to say, one of them now has the majority of my day-to-day finances.
I can deal with a lack of financial innovations (e.g., virtual debit cards). But the baseline service has to be worth the sacrifices. And as far as this lone voter is concerned, it is not.
Zooming out from my quibbles with the organization itself, I wonder about representation at the board level of whatever replaces the 3 current CU's. With most of Caisse and Assiniboine's assets being in and around Winnipeg and Eastman, one wonders if the Westman locations (most of the Westoba footprint) will just become an afterthought amongst the company.
I have to question whether it is always the best solution for locally based co-operatives to seek resiliency through mergers and acquisitions. After all, though there are increased benefits with scale, the complications also increase. As does the chance of becoming (or at very least, being perceived as) the consumer-unaware monolith that CUs and co-operatives are supposed to be taking the place of. Going by my own anecdote alone, it seems like this has already occurred.
And the votes have yet to be cast.
Am I off-base with this? What is your take (if any)?<:!- W ->:
Edited by Simonwalcal, 2024-05-30 22:40:15