What is the difference between a bank and a building society?

What is the difference between a bank and a building society? and which is better?

  • also can I use my local post office to open a building society? it would be much more convenient travel wise this way.

  • Answer:

    http://www.bsa.org.uk/difference_bank_bs.htm Banks are financial institutions that we are all aware of. In fact, all of us have experience of having an account with a bank and availing its services. However, not many people know about building societies that serve similar functions like banks and are owned by members of the society. Despite not being a bank, a building society has many financial services like lending, mortgage to its members. Though the number of such building societies is dwindling fast, UK is one country where one can still find a number of such societies accepting deposits and lending money to members just like other private and government banks. What then are the differences between banks and building societies? Let us take a closer look. Of late, there has been a lot of talk of de-mutualization, which means allowing a building society to turn itself into a bank to survive in these hard economic times

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Basically a Building Society is owned by the members, anyone that has any type of account or mortgage with them, and is run for their members benefit. A bank is owned by it's shareholders and run for their benefit. Account holders are customers and the bank will try to make as much out of them as they can. A Building Society should therefore be better. You can't open a Building Society Account at the Post Office, I think their banking services are run by Allied Irish, or someone like that.

John D

just read your question - how can you ever open a Building Society at your local post office? You need to find some empty premises to open a building society there, you can't build a building society on top of your local post office.

TrollSpotter

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