One of the nation’s biggest building societies has announced losses for the first half of the year after putting £3 million into supporting its members and the community.
The Nottingham said it will have spent £3 million this year helping its members through the pandemic and supporting various charities.
Unaudited accounts for the first half of 2020 show it made pre-tax losses of £4.6 million in the first half of the year, compared to a £2.7 million pre-tax profit in the first six months of 2019.
READ MORE: {}
The building society, which merged with Leicestershire’s Shepshed Building Society in 2013, said it was able to keep 60 branches open for essential transactions throughout the lockdown before deciding not to reduce savings rates for at least six months after the Bank of England cut its base rate to 0.01 per cent.
It introduced a three month payment holiday for mortgage holders and introduced a moratorium on possession actions for those facing payment difficulties due to the pandemic, until at least the end of October.
It also trebled planned charitable donations to organisations such as The Trussell Trust food banks, charity partner Framework and The Silver Line for Age 海角视频, which tackles loneliness among the elderly.
Chief executive David Marlow said: “In unprecedented times of national challenge like we are experiencing, it is right that organisations and firms come under intense pressure and scrutiny.
“We as a mutual, owned by our members, believe that we have stepped up and met those challenges – using our financial strength to support our members, stakeholders and the communities that we serve.
Most Read
“Our main aim has been on ensuring that we play our full part in tackling this national crisis.
“We believe the measures and support options we have implemented were the right thing to do, to be there for our members and communities at this most difficult time, irrespective of the cost.
“Our mutual ethos and financial strength, in the shape of our capital which has been built up for more than 160 years, has enabled us to deliver that support. Because of our strength, we also decided not to take available government support in the shape of furlough payments, as we are fortunate enough to be able to finance and support ourselves and members – strong evidence of the delivery of the mutual benefit.
“There is no doubt that 2020 will stand out as a unique and challenging year.
"As a mutual we have demonstrated that when confronted with such significant challenges, we can deploy our financial strength built up over more than 160 years to the benefit of our members.
“The next 12 months will continue to bring challenges as the full economic impact of the pandemic takes its toll but we remain in a good position to absorb these factors and invest in our future, whilst continuing to trade strongly in challenging economic conditions.
"We firmly believe that, despite the challenges of the past few months, we are very well-placed to fulfil our purpose of enabling a growing membership to save, plan for and protect their financial futures, whatever the circumstances.”
Despite the lockdown, the society – the ninth biggest in the 海角视频 with assets of £3.86 billion – said mortgage lending to June was up a quarter on the first half of 2019, to £232 million.