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We asked members of the Customer Union (and Save Our Bank supporters) to send in questions that they'd like us to ask the Co-operative Bank at our regular meeting with them in September 2020.

We assembled - and in some cases amalgamated - a list of questions from members before presenting them to the bank for initial discussion. The bank then went away to consider a more detailed response, and there was a further dialogue. It's taken a while for us to collate the responses and write this up. We'll try and turn this round more quickly in future.

The issues covered are listed below. Click on a subject for details of our question and the bank’s responses.

January 2021

The Co-operative Bank has announced that it has renewed its support for The Hive – a programme delivered by Co-operatives UK to support new co‑operative start-ups, help grow existing co‑ops and help business convert to co-operative or community ownership.

The Hive was launched in 2016, and has already received £1.3 million in funding from the bank. This has helped over 1,000 co-operatives and groups with support including direct business advice, workshops, training and mentoring.

The Co-operative Bank informed us (on Monday 21 December 2020), that the discussions around a potential bid for the bank have ended.

This brings to an end the speculation around a bid, reported by Sky News to be from Cerberus Asset Management, later picked up by The Guardian.

21st November CUEB Gathering – 2:30pm

Introduction

This is a short report from the 5th annual Gathering of the Save Our Bank campaign and Customer Union for Ethical Banking (CUEB). As in the last three years, we were joined by representatives of the Co-operative Bank. We also had 55 attendees at the start of the gathering; a record for any CUEB meeting so far.

Report from Maria Cearns and Lesley McPherson of the Co-operative Bank

The Co-operative Bank has been approached by a prospective buyer.

Guardian and Sky news identify as Cerberus Capital Management

In line with our formal recoginition agreement, the Co-op Bank informed the Customer Union on 17 November that it had received "a non-binding offer for the bank" and that "discussions are at a very preliminary stage". The bank went on to say that "Our priority and focus remains to deliver our agreed plan and transformation over the coming years". The formal announcement by the bank, made to conform with regulatory requirements is here:

The Cooperative Bank has been named Current Account Provider of the year in the Moneyfacts awards 2020.

Lee Tillcock, Editor of Moneyfacts said "By continuing to provide support via a straightforward and reasonable agreed overdraft rate and a leading rewards bonus, the Co-operative Bank is the deserved winner of the Best Current Account Provider category at the 2020 Moneyfacts Awards."

You can read the Co-operative Bank press release here.

The Cooperative Bank has announced Q1 2020 trading results.

we are providing payment holidays for approximately 17,000 mortgage, loans and credit card customers to date

Headlines are:

CEO of the Co-operative Bank, Andrew Bester, has issued a message addressed to all customers.

The message, which you can view here, makes it clear that the Bank will stand behind customers, explains that the bank is getting a lot of calls, and warns about scams. 

Stay safe and look after each other, and please remember we are here to help.