Nationwide will give members an £100 boost after another “stellar” year, its CEO has announced.
The building society’s fourth Fairer Share payment, unveiled on Thursday, means 4.4m members will be eligible for the cash payment in June.
It comes after another successful year for the building society, which leaves the CEO Dame Debbie Crosbie as probably the most powerful woman in banking.
The building society made a pre-tax profit of £1.49 billion for the year to the end of March.
In the past year, Nationwide has also lured another 1m new current account customers after upping its competitive assault on the big high street banks.
Meanwhile, its profits helped it to return £1.8bn in value for members in the form of higher savings and lower mortgages.
Nationwide, the fastest growing brand in UK financial services, also saw more people who switch account choose it over any other provider. It offers a £175 switching bonus to new customers.
It doubled its share of student current account openings to 43 per cent, which suggests the mutuality message is popular among the young. It has won praise from the industry for putting first-time buyers first.
Under Dame Debbie, Nationwide has adopted a more combative stance, with TV adverts featuring actor Dominic West which mock the big banks for bad service and branch closures.
Nationwide has made a promise to keep all branches open until at least 2030.
Dame Debbie said: “These stellar results are exactly what we want to deliver for our 22 million Nationwide customers. I am delighted that more than a million more people opened a Nationwide account this year. It is testament to our commitment to providing the best service possible.
“It has been especially pleasing to see such a strong rise in students joining Nationwide. Holding the number one position in high street banking across the three crucial areas of mortgages, personal savings and current account balances shows how competitive and ambitious we are. We’re proud to serve the growing number of people and businesses who choose Nationwide.”
On the Fairer Share payment, Dame Debbie added: “Once again, we will reward people who use us for their main banking with a £100 Fairer Share payment. And all Nationwide members can now open a new savings bond at an exclusive rate.
“We are proud to be recognised as the UK’s best bank, and we will continue to deliver the value, service and choice our customers deserve. My commitment is to make sure every customer feels secure, supported and valued.”
Dame Debbie’s most controversial move was the £2.9bn takeover of Virgin Money in 2024, which bolstered the building society’s earnings. Critics have worried that it would be difficult to integrate the two. That deal meant that one in three people in the UK now have a connection to Nationwide.
Nationwide says it has made “significant progress” on merging Virgin Money, which is seen as strong in business banking. Customers will begin to migrate from Virgin to the Nationwide brand this year.
Fans of mutuality note that while some big banks, notably RBS, needed a direct government bailout during the 2008 global financial crash, Nationwide did not.
Nationwide was named Which? bank brand of the year last year and took gold in the Retail Banking sector at the Britain’s Most Admired Companies awards. It says it has been first for customer satisfaction among its peer group for 14 consecutive years.
Nationwide traces its history back to 1884 and prides itself on being a mutual owned by its members. It says that without shareholders to reward, over time it should always offer cheaper home loans than the big banks.
David Hollingworth at L&C Mortgages said: “Nationwide has long made first time buyers a priority and that continues. It has looked to solve the affordability conundrum for first time buyers, flexing criteria to as much as 6x income as part of its Helping Hand proposition. It is also consistently ‘there or thereabouts’ when it comes to the Best Buy tables, taking on the big banks in what has been an aggressively competitive marketplace.”
Adam French, head of consumer finance at Moneyfactscompare.co.uk, said: “While Nationwide’s traditional savings accounts and ISAs may not currently top the best buy charts on rates alone, it is very competitive. It’s fixed, child’s and regular saver products all offer returns comfortably above the rate of inflation which is critical for cash savers looking to protect their nest egg from the corrosive effects of rising prices.”
