Talk:Nationwide Building Society

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Since it is the largest UK building society, and there are only five banks with greater financial assets according to Banks of the United Kingdom, isn't Nationwide the sixth, rather than seventh, largest high street financial institution in the UK, or am I missing something? -- Bonalaw 12:45, 2 September 2005 (UTC)

Abbey national was sixth until it was taken over.

Ah yes, that'll be it. Thanks. --Bonalaw 12:11, 20 February 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Opening paragraph 2 History 3 ISP 4 Promoting itself 5 Key People 6 Interest

[edit] Opening paragraph

Presently the opening paragraph reads: One of the major UK mutual building societies remaining today is the Nationwide Building Society, with headquarters in Swindon, Wiltshire, South West England.

1) Aren't all building societies in the UK mutual organisations? To me, 'mutual building society' reads like 'unmarried bachelor', with the 'mutual' being unnecessary (and information that should be obtainable from the building society page.

2) NBS is clearly the largest building society in the UK by just about any relevant measure, if not all such measures. Why have it as only 'one of the major' UK building societies remaining when it is the largest building society in the world?

Thoughts and comments, anyone, before I make the relevant amendments? Matthew 13:25, 24 July 2006 (UTC)

I think 'one of the major' is meant in the context of original building societies, i.e. Nationwide is the last big one left, the only big one that didn't de-mutualise. I agree with the 'unmarried bachelor' statement, I beleive a building society has to be mutual by law (i.e. non PLC, hence why all the de-mutualised building societies that became PLCs didn't retain the name building society in their legal titles or brand names). -- thingiemajig - 26 July 2006

Point taken re the intent of 'one of the major', but the way it's written at present makes it sound as though there are other building societies that are of comparable size to NBS and also remain.

I know Halifax and Abbey were larger building societies before they demutualised; were any of the others also larger? Matthew 21:46, 26 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] History

I am unsure of the dates for this but I first became a member of a building society in the 1950s. The society was the Hastings Building Society. At a later date it merged with (I think) the Preston Building Society (Lancashire) and at an even later date the merged society merged again with the Anglia BS. If anyone knows of those dates it will help to add a little more info to this article Peter Shearan 05:37, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

From memory, there's a large 'family tree' at the old Anglian Head Office in Northampton that shows all the mergers through time and when they were. Matthew 07:03, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ISP

Is Nationwide's ISP offering from the late 1990s worth a mention, does anyone think? And does anyone know much about it? Someone somewhere must have one of the installation discs still kicking around! :-) Matthew 11:18, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Promoting itself

I noticed that Nationwide Building Society IP added it's own URL to promote it's 'Sponsored By You' campaign: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=prev&oldid=145649109.

http://www.dnsstuff.com/tools/whois.ch?ip=155.192.35.8

Surely, this violates Wikipedia policy? --77.5.108.187 (talk) 03:57, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

also, the 'Society Spokespeople' section reads like a corporate 'About Us' page, and has probably just been copied and pasted. It includes references to 'our customers'. 79.77.97.146 (talk) 18:49, 7 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Key People

I agree with the editor above who suggested that the language red like the company's own words; i have cut out all except the most basic description of each person: Their job title. Checking other companies, such as RBOS, Alliance and Leicester, Tesco, and even Wal-Mart, that is the most that the equvalent, non-controversial people get. Cheers, Lindsay 20:06, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Interest

Not only was the Key People section overloaded, but the Interest section, though interesting (sorry!) is more suited to interest than this specific institution. Certainly we don't need details of how Nationwide calculates interest and their policies about it; that reads more like one of their brochures to interested customers. Thus, i'm gonna remove it. Cheers, Lindsay 06:46, 19 April 2008 (UTC)