Navigating Credit: Insights from the Irish League of Credit Unions

About this event

The Irish League of Credit Unions (ILCU) has 81 affiliated credit unions in Northern Ireland. This session will provide:

· an overview of the credit union sector in Northern Ireland;

· the work that credit unions undertake in their communities;

· what makes a credit union unique; and

· the advantages of being a credit union member.

"More than two thirds of adults in Northern Ireland own a credit card, despite 43% being unaware of interest rates".

This is a statistic from recent research carried out by the ILCU in credit card usage.

We will be looking into the research conducted by the ILCU in relation credit cards (and the impact that the lack of understanding about credit cards can have on consumers) as well as back to school research costs and the latest results from the ILCU’s quarterly consumer sentiment index.

There will be Q&A at the end of the session - please get in touch with your questions or queries beforehand if you have anything specific to ensure we can answer it for you on the day or with a FAQ document after the event.

About the organisation: The Irish League of Credit Unions (ILCU)

The Irish League of Credit Unions (ILCU) is the largest credit union representative body on the island of Ireland. Founded in 1960 with the aim of providing representation, leadership, co-operation, support and development for credit unions in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, the ILCU today has an affiliated membership of more than 250 credit unions in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland.

Who should attend?

All money guidance practitioners are welcome to attend this free event. This could include staff in Northern Ireland who are supporting service users with difficult conversations and anyone offering guidance to improve the financial wellbeing of the users of their service.

Accessibility & other details

The event takes place on Microsoft Teams. If you have accessibility requirements, please inform the hosts when you register by emailing moneyguidersni@reed.com and we will do our best to meet them.

For example, we can support by providing the slides prior to the events, ensuring there is a transcript on the event and requesting that 1 person take all questions to allow a screen reader to function correctly. If there is anything else, we can support please don't hesitate to reach out directly.

Participants should always remember to keep their own client and customer details confidential and not disclose personal information about them.

The Money Guidance Competency Framework

This event is designed to help you improve your money guidance practice, developing skills, confidence and knowledge around credit unions. Everything that the Money Guiders programme offers centres around the Money Guidance Competency Framework - it's there to help you better understand the full breadth and depth of money related issues that fall outside of the regulated financial advice service sector - the things you talk to your customers about.

Which part of the competency framework applies to the event?

Technical Domain 3 Borrowing Tier1: Awareness of main sources of credit and lending (e.g. banks, Credit Unions) and the differences between them

Foundation Level - Signposting customers and Safeguarding: all practitioners – no matter their job role – must be able to elicit simple, factual information from the customer in order to signpost them to appropriate sources of further support, advice or information.

Before attending this session, you could spend some time considering the challenges you face in your work, specifically when you provide help and guidance to your clients or service users around money issues.