Musings from the CU Suite

Written by Anthony Demangone

There's nothing worse than hearing a member utter these terrible six words.

I didn't know you did that!

Well, we hear those words here at NAFCU sometimes as well. And it kills us as much as it kills you.

From my point of view, here are 10 of our "sometimes hidden benefits" of NAFCU membership

1. Free calculators. NAFCU members have access to an arsenal of free website calculators. It is worth checking out, especially if you currently pay for yours. 
2. Free board briefing/senior staff briefing. If you're a NAFCU member, we'll provide a free NAFCU Washington Update. We'll do it in person when we can, but we're also able to do virtual briefings. It is perfect for a board meeting.
3. The Benchmark. Our quarterly member-only CU Performance Benchmark report measures your credit union’s financial performance against regional and asset class peers and monitors emerging trends in the industry. A good many of our members use the information as slides in their board meetings. Every CFO who looked at this has said they love it. Our research gurus will soon add another report that focuses on expenses. Stay tuned.
4. Compare rates, nationally, or by state.  Presented by the National Association of Federal Credit Unions in cooperation with SNL and Datatrac.  Rates based upon a survey of 125,238 financial institution locations in 18,111 markets across the United States.
5. A free, enhanced-listing on CULookup.com.   A no-brainer in my book. Make sure you have that enhanced listing.
6. The Compliance GPS. Now, this one isn't included in the cost of membership. But if I were a credit union, the first $399 I had to throw at compliance would go to purchase this manual. It is electronic, and can be shared throughout your entire org for no extra cost 
7. Free white papers and briefings from our preferred partners. Ideal for doing due diligence on a number of topics.
8. BSA Quizzes. Our quarterly BSA Blast contains quizzes, perfect for keeping your employees on their "BSA toes." 
9. The NAFCU Today and Update. These publications do a great job of keeping you up-to-date. Perfect for executives, board members and other volunteers. In an age of increasing fiduciary duties, reading these documents would go a long way to showing examiners how serious your board members are about staying up-to-date with industry news and developments.
10. The sanity check. You've looked at an issue for too long. Have you missed an angle? Have others looked at this before? Shoot us an email or give us a call. You'd be surprised how many times another set of eyeballs on something can shed new light on an issue.

So to you NAFCU members reading this, I hope you take advantage of all we have to offer. And we can never say this enough.

Many thanks for all you do for NAFCU!

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Speaking of thanks...a quick shout-out to all the Congressional Caucus attendees this week who've been hitting the Hill to tell our story. Many thanks to you all!