The history of WAW Credit Union

WAW is a proudly local financial institution, having been part of many of our communities for more than 65 years.

Our story began with the coming together of three locally established Credit Unions across the region - St Patrick’s Co-operative Credit Society in Wangaratta, Our Lady’s Wangaratta Co-operative Credit Society, and the Wodonga Credit Co-operative Society.

Having commenced operations in 1964, the Wangaratta societies decided on a merger in November 1970 to form the Wangaratta Credit Co-operative.

The Wodonga Credit Co-operative commenced in 1961 to help people in the community manage their money, and it amalgamated with the Wangaratta Co-operative in 1976. New premises were established in Stanley Street, Wodonga in 1978 at the site of the current WAW Credit Union Head Office, and in 1979 a Service Centre was opened in Albury.

Marking 1980 as a year of dynamic changes in the industry, the Wangaratta Credit Union was incorporated on 30 April 1980 under the name WAW Credit Union Co-operative Limited, the name representing the three cities of Wangaratta, Albury, and Wodonga.

More mergers followed with the Beechworth and Ovens Credit Union (1989), Bandiana Credit Union (1998), B-W Albury Credit Union (2002) and Albury Murray Credit Union (2002). In all cases, we continued to combat the very high level of competition which had developed in financial services and sought to provide our members with a wide range of services across our local region.

Today, WAW is a modern financial institution with a full Banking Licence under the Banking Act and recognised as an Authorised Deposit-taking Institution (ADI) under Federal Regulations.

We have grown to service over 25,000 customers across the region, with local Service Centres in Albury, Wodonga, Lavington, Beechworth, Yackandandah, Chiltern, Wangaratta, Myrtleford, Tallangatta, Corryong, Walla Walla, Walwa, and Moulamein.

We’re proud of our continued growth, but we continue to value the origins and history of each of the organisations that have come together to form WAW Credit Union. And importantly, we appreciate how each town within our region continues to contribute something unique to our locally-focused, customer-owned bank.