In late July 2020, Ms. Gail Lewis led a “lunch and learn” webinar for the public about the basics of credit and how you can improve your credit standing and score.
Check out the recording and the transcript below!
Gail Lewis: Okay, good afternoon everyone. Can you hear me?
Female: Yes, we can, good afternoon.
Gail Lewis: Okay, so basically what we’re going to do is mute everybody’s mic until we ask questions and then we’ll unmute you for your answers are your response to what I’m asking and then at the end, we’ll open up everyone mic for questions and answers. So, thank you all for joining us, we are happy to have you, we’re delighted to be able to take this opportunity to tell you about how we’re continuing our efforts to partner with you as a trusted community partner, we’ve been around since 1935, and we’re always looking for ways to improve what you’re doing financially, your financial health, and to continue to improve our organization and what we’re about. So, you are what we are about, and we’re much like you, you, we argue in the sense of, we need the same things for our families.
We’re trying to do the same thing to manage our finances and put out stuff in a better position not only as individual associates working at one to one financial but as a company as your credit union. So, welcome, we thank you for joining us. And I think we’re going to learn a little something today and things we already know and learn a few more things. Just keep in mind that afterward, if you have questions that you feel is just so personal, you don’t want to share with the group you can always contact me afterward my information will be up there on the screens. I want to take this opportunity to just thank my marketing team for standing behind me. Of course, if everything goes straight, you can give them all the credit and if we have any problems, you can blame them because they’re doing all of the mechanical stuff, so all of the technical stuff they’re doing for me, so I’ve just wanted to make sure they know how much I appreciate them, and that we’re all in this together and we’re working together.
So, I’m going to introduce myself, I am your financial education specialist, and you should know if you didn’t that the credit union has provision for you to be educated about your finances beyond what we’re doing at our branches when you come in, they want to make sure they have someone on staff that can further assist you and even beyond what I’m doing, we have someone that can help you. And we’ll talk a little bit about that later about Green Power financial wellness, who we partner with to make sure that you have a good understanding of your finances and best and better ways that you can take care of your money and make it work for you. So, we’re going to start with the slides now objective today for this lunch and learn and we hope you got your lunch, sorry we couldn’t we know what the pandemic, we weren’t able to have it someplace where we could have got you lunch and had you come in and see you and we miss that, but we’re making the best of these times and doing it the way we can do it and learning some different ways that we can take care of you and still get these messages out to you.
So, at the end of this seminar-workshop today, I went intend is that you will have a little bit better understanding of types of credit, the meaning of credit, what one-to-one and other lenders consider and look at when you apply for credit, how to establish credit, or how to maintain and manage that credit that you do have, and what you can do if you’re already in over your head or have more debt than you want or can handle at this point.
So, we hope that this understanding of credit would just put you in a position where whatever choices you’ve made, if they’re great, that you can continue on that path. If you’re not as proud of them, as you would like to be, that you’ll have an opportunity at the end of this to correct some things or redo some things and get on track, get to where you want to be. Okay, the next slide Okay, so, this is a question and we can unmute the mics and think about it a little bit and maybe someone would want to share, maybe not. What is your attitude about credit?
Questions.
I need to know how to improve it?
Gail Lewis: Okay, say it again.
I need to know how to improve it?
Gail Lewis: How to improve it, okay, that’s great. Anybody else? What’s your attitude– what are you thinking about credit? What do you hope we talk about or what are you wishing that we cover?
Questions
Credit scores?
Gail Lewis: Credit scores? Okay.
This is Jody, I think credit can be a great thing to help us get the things that we can’t afford to pay for right away.
Gail Lewis: Okay.
Jody: But one of my worries is always to try and make sure that I don’t go too far into debt. And then I’m not struggling to pay my monthly bills, especially if unforeseen things happen like a pandemic.
Gail Lewis: Okay.
Jody: We never know.
Gail Lewis: So, she’s concerned about that balance of credit, someone wanting to improve their credit, someone’s wanting to hear a little bit more about credit scores. So, as you can see, we have a community on the line. We’re a community credit union and credit we have all different types of opinion about it. We’re going to be emailing you out these handouts and they’re just food for thought. It’s just to evaluate yourself as we’re doing a lot of that during this pandemic. So, we can take this time and take a look at that worksheet when you get it by email, whatever email you use to sign in, we’ll send that out to you. It’s no wrong, or right, it’s no good or bad, it’s just a way to take a general look at what your attitude, what your thoughts might be about credit. And whenever we take a look at something and see where we are, it’s also the perfect opportunity to take a look at and decide, do we want to do something different?
Did we in one season, maybe we looked one way and thought one way, maybe another point in our life, we look at it a little bit different and think another way? So, don’t be too hard on yourself don’t put too much pressure, be honest about it, and move on. It’s just the way to take a look at what you’re thinking, what you would like to happen for you in the future. What is credit? Credit is borrowed money that we can use to purchase goods and services when we need them. And I would even add when we want them. So, we can– we love the word used at one to one. We love using credit wisely. So, credit as one person said early, it can be a good thing. Sometimes what was meant to be an asset to us, we can go overboard with it and it can become a problem.
But in general, we’re there for you if you do need to borrow money to take care of goals or financial dreams or desires needs that you have, we’re there for you to lend you that money. Yes, that money will be paid back as agreed plus applicable finance charges. So, there are no interest-free loans for the most part. So, your payback will include your interest charge. So, basically, you have four different types of credit. You have your charge card account, your revolving credit, your installment credit, and your service contracts. Your service contracts generally are not going to be reported on your credit Bureau report.
They can be your gym contracts, they can be with your people that do take care of your lawn, they could be with the pets control people, those are your service contracts. Your installment loans are generally going to be a set amount due to a set time of the month, each month. And they remained that way until the agreed-upon paid out the date, the revolving credit is going to be more or less like your gift credit card, charge cards, debit. So, those are your basic four types sometimes they are narrative two types when we talk about secured and unsecured credit. So, how will you handle your credit? There are no guarantees for life happens. And so we start out, it is our intention to pay as agreed, but how you will handle your credit can be something you sat down with and plan to do as far as your budget. How are you going to handle that payment that you requested okay?
So, the advantages and disadvantages of credit, the advantages are credit it’s convenient. And at one to one financial, of course, we strive to make that a convenient process for you. Immediate purchasing power when you have credit, a no need for cash or to worry about cash on handbills can be consolidated. Disadvantages of credit, in some, I particularly don’t call this a disadvantage when you use credit wisely, but when you have credit, you have a loan and some call that a disadvantage. If you’ve worked through your financial situation and know that something you need, then I throw that right back on the side of it’s an advantage interest rate may go up may include additional fees.
You can overspend, which we know could be done either way, but sometimes the temptation is a little bit more there when we’re just swiping the card or pulling the card out, and then it can promote what we call in the credit world, impulse buying, impulse shopping. So, sometimes we’re out there, we see something, we just got to have it. We got that card just pretty easy to swipe it, swipe it but we’re going to talk some more and we’ll have all of that up under the control. And some of the disadvantages may not be for us as individuals, as we mature as we grow and develop.
So, why is good credit so important sometimes when I’m out talking with young people or adults, and I’ll say the credit scores range from 300 up to 850, and I say, which is better and of course higher is better. And I will ask them, well, who cares? Why does it matter? And I’ll just listen up for answers from them so I’ll ask the group that why is good credit so important? And we can open it up. Anybody?
Questions
[Inaudinle18:51] the higher, your credit scores sometimes [inaudible18:57]
Gail Lewis: Okay, the better and I think I’m hearing MC if I can cut you up a little bit on my end, but what I thought I heard you say is the better the credit score, the better the interest rate you will get?
Yes, that is correct
Gail Lewis: And that is absolutely correct. So, that’s a loss of money. So, that’s an impact on our income or our wallet, or are the money that we have to save or the money that we have to entertain ourselves. So, that’s huge that impact there, the interest rate, the– your credit score drives your interest rate. So, that’s a true statement. Anybody else? Why is it important to have good credit?
Questions
Jody: Oh, it’s Jody, I think also good, so many different areas of our life, look at our credit. I mean, insurance employment so, I think it’s important to have good credit just for everything really.
Gail Lewis: Right, so, it certainly impacts I would say almost every area of our life, employers run credit. It can have an impact on your employment so there’s a lot of areas sometimes when I’m out talking out there, chuckle at this, I’d say relationships, some sometimes you may not want someone with a poor credit history that says something to you that speaks to something about that person’s character, they’re not a person that does as they agree to do. So, it does matter it has an impact on almost every area of our life who needs to build good credit? And I would say looking at this photo that we tried to make an attempt to say, everyone, everyone needs to be a good credit. It works for just the esteem of an individual having good credit. There are some households where they tend to do a little bit of competition of whose score is higher, nothing too serious, but you want to have good credit. Credit reporting agencies we use mostly one-to-one financial Experian and Equifax, but these are the eight, the three major Credit Bureau out there. You can get your credit report pool once a year for free an annual credit report.com is who we recommend. That’s sometimes free is free, but you hear different sites out there, but that’s the one we generally recommend at our workshops and seminars use the annualcreditreport.com. Okay?
What’s in a credit report? That’s a good question. What identifying information is in your credit report, and I’ll also talk to you a little bit about, what’s not in your credit report. So, identifying you is exactly what identifying information is your name, date of birth, social security number, that’s your identity. So, that’s how we know who we’re dealing with, that we have you. Job history I will put a question by that not so much nowadays days of old, you would see we actually keyed in where the person was employed.
Very rarely do you see that we left it out there because it could be a situation where it’s out there, but rarely is credited key in your employment This is also an opportunity for us to tell you that when we evaluate you for credit, we’re looking at your income and it does not have to be job-driven. So, wherever your income is coming from, that’s the income we use, verifiable income that you have. So, if you’re not working, don’t count yourself out. If you are in need of credit, a creditor’s payment history that’s out there, legal actions, if you file bankruptcy, if there were liens filed against you, that’s out there, inquiries. So, if you go somewhere and they inquire about your credit, and mostly when you’re applying for credit, you’re not going to find any institution that’s not going to have to pull your credit. This may not– this– and I shouldn’t even say may not this will not be speaking of an employer that pull your credit, that won’t show up in your credit history. That will be more like a private type of inquiry that they did so that won’t show up in your credit history or affect your credit history. But what’s not in there, things like your race, we don’t say if it’s male or female, your gender so, just know that this is a system using this reporting and their reporting, your identity, of course, maybe or maybe not your work history, your credit history and legal actions that are out there. And what other creditors are inquiring on your credit. Okay?
What about errors? Of course, like, like any business, there can be mistakes with the credit Bureau, those numbers that we put up earlier that can be used for corrections it is a process, the process does work I didn’t qualify myself in the beginning, but I’ve been a credit union for over 37 years or about 37 years. Oftentimes I don’t even say that because I could just be dating myself saying I’m an old lady, but my point for telling you that would be to say to you the years of experience that I have, I spend about 32 plus of those years in lending my lending career and I retired out and I’m doing what I was doing on the side, basically living my dream, doing the financial education. So, when we talk about errors on the credit report, I say that to say to you, yes, I’ve seen a few. Yes, there is a process out there. Yes, the process work does have to follow the process, but we can get those things corrected that should not be on our credit report. And if there’s anybody in that category, certainly feel free we can get together after we finish.
So, how is your FICO score determined? So, Fair Isaac came up with this FICO score, you may have heard it referred to as your beacon score or your credit score, all the same thing. What I want you to remember about this so that we don’t overwhelm you with information, you’re going to have a great credit score if your payment history is good, 35% is driven by do you pay as agreed? So yes, there are other factors that contribute to that, but the primary factor, what you want to keep in mind pay as agreed. That’s what’s going to get you a good credit score. So, how do you rank with your credit score? And I love this display here because it says to me in particular in these times, things not as bad as we think they are, if you would take note the higher the range 750 to 799, which is a good credit score, you got 27% of the population with that score. Of course, we want to get to 800, 850 there’s about half 13% of the population with that score. So, if you take a look at these, you will see that it may not be as bad as we think the number of people that’s running with the lower credit scores. The thing I do want to say about the lower credit scores and our credit union, one-to-one financial, of course, you can still get what you need oftentimes with the lower credit score, your interest rate may be driven by that.
And it may be a little bit higher, but you don’t have to count yourself out of your needs and your wants until you get up to that 800. We desire for you to reach your goal, just like you want to reach it. What we want you to know that we can make your loan, we can do business with you with less of a score than your preferred 800 to 850 scores. So, what if your card of groups and have much credit history? Not a problem. We can work with you with a limited credit history. Again, what we’re able to offer you maybe something different, but we can work with you as well as talk to you about how you can build your credit history. So, there are things that places that we go that may not be reporting to the Credit Bureau, but we can get with them and try to do what we call, build a file oftentimes when we’re looking. So, being a part of a credit union organization where, you know, you’re, we’re member-owned and you’re a member, we can work with you in those areas. So, feel free to reach out to us don’t count yourself out. Let us take a look at what you’re speaking of when you say I have a limited credit history or I have no credit history.
Okay. Who can look at your credit score? Lenders, landlord’s insurance companies, potential employers and we’ve talked a little bit about that, but just know when you see that the glass there, where we’re looking through at your credit report like I say, some lenders consider that credit report as a snapshot of you. So, we are looking at your credit file and how you’ve previously paid creditors to determine the likelihood of the request that you’re making, being paid. So, we do pull your credit report for accounts, and for loans, credit cards are as far as other places you’re going, of course, your landlord’s insurance companies, potential employers may be also pulling your report. You will know that they’re putting your report because they will often times have to get a signature from you. How did you establish your credit? So, what are your thoughts on this? What’s your comments audience? How do you establish credit? Do we have a group of already established people? Did we have unexpended credit? Who do we have out there that’s willing to talk up, speak up?
Questions
Hi, it’s Erica, I would say either with a secure card or as far as with either Fingerhut or jewellers club.
Gail Lewis: Okay.
Erica: That’s how you would establish one
Gail Lewis: Okay, great, so. We know that we have people on the line that either have already done this, or they are savvy with their money. They’re well aware of what happens here. But we still kept it very simple we just want to say, get banked, get into the branch and get that account open, start putting some money away. Get a credit card the person that spoke up said a secured credit card, secure credit card with your own money, start paying as agreed. That’s how you establish your credit. So, what else do creditors consider? And we being the creditor one-to-one financial again this is something that’s been out in the credit world for all of my 37 years in the business and well beyond. I’ve heard about it for years. The three C’s of credit, character, capital, and capacity. So, from your credit union standpoint, as a lender, we look at that as your ability to pay based on the history of how you’re paying. As I said early what Kappa do you have? What are your assets? When we look at the credit application or whatever, if there is like of credit there, that could be a way that we could build up saying that loan is okay, your capacity to pay your ability to pay. Like I said, that’s where we take and put your way out, what income you have coming in up against what debts you have.
So, we don’t want you over-indebted. And we know the repercussions of that and there are some slides but we’ll talk a little bit about that later, but you don’t want to be over-indebted and we don’t want you over-indebted. So, what if you were turned down for credit? What if we could not qualify you for a credit you requested at the time you requested the credit Bureau would give you a free copy of your credit report you wouldn’t know what’s out there on your credit file why you didn’t qualify any of our associates at your branch, as well as myself would be willing to talk to you about what you can do to get the credit you requested. This is where we can be a huge help to you maybe you are aware of this, maybe not, but we want to make sure before we leave off this call, that you’re aware that we can help you with that. So, we’re not able to qualify you for the credit you requested at the time you requested it. We’re certainly able to talk to you about what you can do to get on track.
How do you maintain good credit? And we hope all of you are where you would like to be, but we’re certainly aware that there are some of us still aiming for that 800 850-credit score. So, how do you maintain? You have some credit, but you want to maintain it. A spending plan is always a great start and then live within that spending plan. So, if you have a budget or a spending plan, that’s you look at that before you even apply a lot of times, that’s what have you determined what amount you want to pay on that car, or how much you want to spend for a house payment? Often times we will do what we call pre-qualify you, or do a preapproval and say, it’s a car sale or something coming up. And we’ll say you qualify for 50,000.
You could get a car for 50,000, but perhaps you don’t want a $50,000 car because, you know, there are lots of things that we didn’t even ask you about that you like to do for your entertainment or of your lifestyle. So, you having a budget create that moment, where even as a lender, if we say we’re okay with you getting a car for this amount, you determined, no, I don’t want a car payment over this amount, or I don’t want to borrow, but X amount of dollars. So, maintaining good credit is deciding what do you want to spend on the items that you’re buying on credit? And then you know that that’s within your budget, you can maintain your lifestyle as well as your good credit
Managing credit it’s a little bit different managing credit, let’s just use an example of say, you have gotten in over your head again, we’re paying green path financial wellness, and you can go to the website upon the resources and financial education, and you can learn more about them, but we’re paying them for our members that just say, we just got too much going on now, but the amount of income that we have, and we need some help managing this debt. So, they have these debt management plans that they can put you on. They have relationships with creditors, not just us as a credit, one-to-one financial, but credit people that you borrow from, or you have credit within general, they can make contact, let them know what you’re trying to do. Get interest rates, dropped, or lowered and work out a way where you can manage that debt, you don’t have to go to a phase or state where you feel like you need to file bankruptcy, or you just stressed out. You can get that debt up under control with their help managing that debt. So, keep that in mind, if that is your situation, a debt management plan is something where you just cry out for a little bit of help, and you have someone that can help you manage that debt.
What to, for when you’re applying for your first credit card, or I would say when you’re applying for a credit card? Find out what’s out there and then find out what you’re interested in just know there’s no wrong, or right here, there’s no one size fits all. You decide what’s important to you, what you want even right down to the service that we provide for you I would almost say we could have added a bubble with that in there. That that can be very important to you, that we’re here for you, that we’re local, that the service branch associates are going to provide for you if you do have a problem with that credit card. So, take a look at those things when you’re deciding where you want to apply. What to look for in a credit card, you’re going to want to, this is where I say, we like to say it just says something.
We say reading is fundamental, but take a read over what you’re signing, what you’re agreeing to just know what you’re getting into upfront. It can keep down some of the anxiety or the fallout at the back end. So, take a read over your disclosures that you’re signing and agreeing to. The credit card, accountability, responsibility, and disclosure act that’s a mouthful basically came out in 2009 and a lot of the stuff was just taken care of for us that should have always been made plain and clear. One of the big major things it did was with the student credit cards and the way things were maybe being dingo before students on college campuses and things to offer them credit that maybe they weren’t able to pay or would take a lifetime if you will, to pay off. And so, they came out of school already in a whole lot of debt along with the student loan debt.
And it was just overwhelming to see young people with such a burden of debt as your credit union we were never doing it that way, but we were offering some student cards and you had to stop that by this disclosure and this act, you had to qualify these young people for this debt. And so that was one of the huge ways that act affected us as your credit union and you as our members, we had to make sure that you had some income to repay that debt and that you qualify to get that card that we were putting into your hand. So, it’s good to know that even beyond what we’re looking at and what we’re concerned about, you have acts and non-legislative acts that’s to your benefit that you’re going to be taken care of. Watch out for the fine print when you applied for a credit card.
And again, I would say read over what you’re signing as someone having worked in the industry for 30 something plus years, again, I will always say as, as one of the ones to one financial associate, it’s always to our benefit that you take a read it sharpens us when you asked us questions and read over the documents that you’re signing because we get the opportunity to explain them and talk a little bit about what that means if there’s any misunderstanding or how that wording affects you if we understand it, but you don’t. And if you ask us to explain it, we’re not able to, that gives us that opportunity to get with someone in that branch or at the corporate office. And help us out to explain that to maybe a member has never asked us about that before.
So, it’s always good when you have questions, there are no silly questions. Ask them questions if you have it again, iron sharpening iron, it gives us that opportunity to make sure that we understand what that document means that you’re signing. How to find the best loan for you? The best loan for you again is largely based on your budget, your lifestyle, your career goals, your goals overall, what whoever you’re partnering with to do your finances, all of these things matter to you.
So, you want to pick the best option for you, while we are living in hope every day, that’s always going to be one to one financial. We know there are very few cases where we may not be your best option. What we strive to be is our intention to be, and we work hard at it. We want to be the place where you come when you do need credit, when you do want to borrow money, when your family members or those persons in your circle need money, we want you to know that we desire to be the place that you come. Dangers of excessive debt. So, I’d like to hear what you think are some of the dangers of being excessively obligated and having too many obligations. What are your thoughts?
Questions
It’s like having buyer’s remorse, right? It feels really good while we’re getting into it and it’s really painful when we’re trying to do deal with it.
Gail Lewis: Okay, so, that’s why I always stick to use credit wisely. And if you think about an institution that would tell you to use us and use us wisely, so you, you would borrow based on– again we want you to have some things you want its life we shouldn’t just live needs, needs, we can only buy groceries, pay the rent, pay the mortgage and do it all over again. We get to have some things that we want in our budget. So, if we do have to make loans to borrow those it is absolutely okay, we just don’t want to go overboard. One, that they have his stress, we don’t need to be stressed out, we don’t want you to stress out, that’s why we look at your debt to income ratio. When we calculate what you qualify for the credit you’ve requested. So, we don’t want you excessively obligated, not having the ability to repay that debt is just the level of stress all by itself. And so, again, that’s why I say there are many things we don’t ask you about on a credit application. We don’t really know your grocery expense, your gas expenses, how much you travel back and forth well, we know in this pandemic environment, we’re not traveling very much, but we don’t know all the things that you’d like to do that you dry, clean everything. So, there are a number of things out there in your budget that we may not ask you about that you’re aware of. So, when we talk about your, what you qualify for versus what you want to spend, that’s very important that you be engaged enough in the process that you don’t take that preapproval and run with it, that you sit and decide, is this going to work for me?
How can you avoid excessive debt? Again, your budget, your thought process, knowing your lifestyle, being aware of warning signs that don’t necessarily have to come from us, but warning signs from you, your own first thought about this, Oh, it’s going to be tight, but I can do it, so, just things like that, maybe you don’t want it that tight. Maybe you want it where it was comfortable upfront. And even if you get extra income, maybe we don’t have to get our dream car as the first car maybe we move up to that. So, one of the other ways that I say you can afford this excessive debt is to put some money aside, take care of some of those emergency things. With some of that money, you’ve put aside where you don’t always have to take a loan again if you need a loan, no problem we can work with you on that. But if you decide, I don’t want to have to run to the credit union to make a loan every time I have an emergency, put some money aside to work out some of those incidentals, some of those things that we know life just happened, and they’re going to come up.
High-interest debt consolidation, watch out for those payday lenders, credit repair clinics, pawnshops, things of that nature. Again, if you have credit issues, come talk with us. Give me a call my information is going to be out there. I will take your call anytime you call me, we can talk about a best or better way to work things out for you we would prefer that you stay away from the pay [inaudible46:43] there is no need for anybody on the call to go pay anyone for credit repair we can work with you, we have green path financial wellness who can do credit report, review the credit report, repair work with you to get things taken off your credit that’s errors to get your credit score up if you just want it up higher, you do not have to go to these credit repair clinics. Pawnshops again, don’t know, you know, what the need would be that would send you there, but try and take advantage of the opportunity to talk with someone, some associate at your, at your branch at the credit union. Give me a call let’s talk about it let’s see if we can do a workaround going to these type places. We know that they’re out there in the community they’re very commonly seen if you take a drive up and down just about any road, they may not be the best for us, but at the same time, we are aware that a lot of our members are choosing these type places.
So, we take advantage of an opportunity like this today to make sure that you know, the resources that you have available through us, and that it’s intentional for us to try to direct you, a redirect you to us as your credit union versus going somewhere that later, maybe just you pay double or triple the amount that you had to pay to take care of the need. So, focused on using credit wisely or self-discipline, of course, it’s always great working with creditors. If you, if you know, you’ve run into a problem, all we want is communication. When I, when I say working with creditors, I have to tell you this. I’m not sure who’s on the call I don’t know if he didn’t come from our collection’s areas there, that we don’t even call collections anymore. So, they’re all about working with you to work out a solution to your problem. So, when we say to contact your creditors and let us know what’s going on, you’d be surprised what help you can get just in that area of them letting you know what they’re able to do. So, take advantage of that opportunity and always continue to educate yourself and we appreciate this opportunity that you joined us today for this moment where we’re just talking about having an understanding of your credit.
And again, I want to thank both Megan and Nicole for their help, with these slides. I am going to alter this one a little bit and say, our credit union can help you with all of your financial challenges. So, we welcome you to give us a call and take advantage of that if you need it, this pandemic has not slowed us down. Our community is still reaching out to us, and we’re still able to offer solutions to you we’re empowered as associates of the credit union to find ways to help you on a personal level so the one to one financial is not just the name it’s what we do that one to one personal service. We’re always going to provide that to you and so feel free to reach out, take advantage of the opportunity to know what resources you have been a credit union member and how it can just help you in your personal goals to either obtain a higher credit score, to have continued with that good credit that you have to get a loan if you need it to get bank, to get those people in your circle bank. If the kids, grandkids, family members don’t have a banking institution that they feel proud about that you feel about your credit union, feel free it’s not that big a deal to switch to another banking institution our associates at the branch would gladly help you with that. So, feel free to reach out if you need that bank account to get started if you need that loan, if you need help with your finances, reach out to us. My information is on the screen again, Megan, Nicole, I thank you both. And we’re going to open it up and see what questions, comments, or concerns you have to think your un-muted and.
Questions
Hi, this is Lynette, Gail thank you so much. Hello.
Gail Lewis: Hi, how are you?
Gail This is Lynette, fine thank you so much. I’m just very thankful that we have this opportunity. My question is when you have credit that you paid down; it is good to close up the credit card is good to do what with it.
Gail Lewis: Okay, so that’s always the question I have not done a workshop where that’s not a question. So, I say again, you know yourself if you can walk around with that card and just say, I have the capacity, I have a $5,000 limit with a zero balance. I’m not going to be using it I’m going to keep it a safe place it’s just a level of security for me and you can handle that I say, that’s great. If you know, that’s not you, you’re going to keep that card and it could cause you to do some impulse shopping on a down day or what some might call a bad day or a day where things just didn’t go the way you like, I say, go ahead, get rid of the card
Lynette: Will that affect my credit score?
Gail Lewis: Say, ask me again, I’m sorry.
Lynette: Now, will that affect the credit score?
Gail Lewis: It could affect your credit score. But to me, from what I’ve seen over the years of my history with this, it’s not going to affect your credit score in a way where it would be worth it if you know, you just don’t have the discipline to handle it. So, I would say if you’re excessive and you have much debt out there, then sitting with that capacity just to build this score would not weigh out as worth it in my opinion.
Lynette: Okay, thank you.
Gail Lewis: So, again, a lot of this, when you’re talking with financial people, we’re very opinionated very passionate about what we do what I always try to keep at mind is a lot of this is about the individual that we’re talking to and what we don’t know matter. So, we can, I can give you my opinion based on my experience, but what I don’t know about you and what you know about you could make the difference. And that’s why I say be wise, if you have to close the account, I am not seeing it where your scores just going punch it down to where it’s like, oh my God, that really messed me up.
Lynette: Right, okay, thanks a lot.
Gail Lewis: Okay, thank you for joining us.
Lynette: You’re welcome.
Ms. Lewis this is Ms. Turner, how are you?
Gail Lewis: I’m fine Ms. Turner, how are you today?
Ms. Tuner: Good thank you, I was wondering I know that the lobbies are not open I was just wondering how you handling the appointment.
Gail Lewis: Okay, the branch I’m not sure if we’re calling it. Is anybody on any associates, the line that’s saying, are we calling in through the contact centre or how are we handling it?
Jamie: Hey Gail its Jamie
Gail Lewis: Hey, Jamie, thank you.
Jamie: Sure, all that you would need to do, Ms. Turner is to go to our website just to go to one to one [inaudible30:00].org and you’re going to be an option to schedule an appointment. And it’s a very user-friendly system just click on the option because it’s how they schedule it. There’s an appointment scheduling system there, and you can go ahead and schedule it based on your location and the branch that’s the most convenient to you.
Ms. Turner: Okay, if I wanted to schedule the appointment with Ms. Lewis, would I be able to do that?
Gail Lewis: Oh, I’m sorry. Oh, with me that, let me give you my cell phone number the number that’s up there is direct to my desk and I get all of those calls, but let me give you, I’m sorry. Thank you, Jamie.
Jamie: Sure, no problem.
Gail Lewis: I thought you were wanting to schedule one to go into the branch.
Ms. Turner: Oh, no
Gail Lewis: So, an appointment with me, you can just call me directly at that number shoot me an email, or I can put my cell phone number also (904) 574-1416.
Ms. Turner: Okay, and what’s the credit union number I’m actually calling in on the–
Gail Lewis: That’s a direct credit union cell phone for me. The credit union number for my desk is 723-6380 (904) area code.
Ms. Turner: Okay.
Gail Lewis: I’m sorry, thank you, Jamie, for coming to my rescue,
Jamie: Thank you very much happy to–
Megan: This is Megan we’ll be able to have a zoom link, privately if this is something, you’d be interested in with Ms. Gail so, for appointments, you can do one on one, just the way we’re doing this also. Thank you.
Gail Lewis: Thank you, dear. Anyone else? Questions, concerns, comments, again we want to say thank you. Did someone else have a question?
No, it’s just saying appreciate the time and the information.
Gail Lewis: Oh, okay, thank you so much. We really appreciate you all joining us and again, just know that we’re continuing in our efforts, even under this pandemic, to find ways that we can reach out and help you improve what you’re doing is just part of our whole vision statement is that we want to, we want to prosper together with you so, we’re working with you to do better with your finances as we do better and we’re going to continue those efforts even under this pandemic. So, thank you so much for joining us. I hope you all enjoyed your lunch and learn and we’ll be doing it again. Hopefully.
Audience: Thank you so much.
Gail Lewis: Thank you. Alright, bye-bye.
