The Directors virtually ran the credit union with a couple of other people who weren't Directors but were very helpful. It was all voluntary work in the early days. A lot of it was done during work time and the employer was happy with that because they knew that the employees were getting benefits out of it.
It was all paper based, people brought cash in, and someone would write out a receipt for it and if anybody wanted a loan, of course we didn’t have big loans in those days, they were only small loans. I think in our first year the maximum loan was $400. Then the whole board would get together and have a look at the loan applications that had come in and they’d approve or otherwise all the loans. It was all voluntary in the early days. We didn’t get our first staff member for quite a few years - Chris Shepherd, Director, Macquarie Credit Union
Macquarie Credit Union Director Chris Sheperd took part in the formation meeting of the credit union in December 1964 and was registered as Macquarie’s 74th member. In the oral history we recorded with Chris last week, he outlined his experiences in the early days of Macquarie Credit Union, his Directorship which began in 1971 including a stint as Chair, Macquarie’s mooted merger with Regional Australia Bank and much else besides. The full transcript of the interview will be available on our website soon.
