Britannia becomes part of CFS and brings together Britannia's extensive high street presence and savings and mortgage product strength, with the personal and corporate banking, insurance and fund management expertise of CFS. The new business will have:
- More than £70 billion of assets
- Nine million customers
- More than 12,000 employees
- More than 300 branches
- 20 corporate banking centres
The business will be led by former Britannia group chief executive Neville Richardson, with Bob Burlton, the current CFS non-executive chairman, chairing the new CFS board.
Bob Burlton comments: "This merger creates a mutual organisation with the scale, financial strength and reputation to provide a wide range of enriched ethical products to millions of UK households, and we are doing this at a time when many people are calling into question the integrity of their banks."
The Co-operative Financial Services will now comprise; The Co-operative Bank - including the Britannia business and internet bank smile - The Co-operative Investments and The Co-operative Insurance.
Both CFS and Britannia will retain their independent products and brands as the two businesses are integrated. The intention is to provide consistency across rates on all similar products as soon as possible to offer honest, fair value for all customers. The first example of this is occurring straight away, where over 35,000 Britannia members on SVR linked mortgages - 15% of the Britannia mortgage book - are seeing their interest rate fall to 4.24% from their previous rate of 4.49%.
