HUME Building Society borrowers got an early Christmas present yesterday with news the bank will pass on 0.2 per cent of the Reserve Bank’s 0.25 per cent interest rate cuts.
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It is effective from tomorrow for new customers and Christmas eve for existing customers.
The bank took 0.1 per cent from its special term deposit rates.
Chief executive Andrew Saxby said the pricing committee agonised over the decision.
“There was a lot of debate,” he said.
“We need to make sure we can still attract deposits and we looked long and hard about what we could afford to do and what was fair to our customers who deposit money with us.”
He said that Hume would watch the big banks closely as they decided on their deposit rates.
So far Commonwealth Bank and National Australia Bank are the only two big banks to pass on the RBA’s cuts announced last Tuesday.
“We’ll watch when others move on their deposit rates,” he said.
“We always balance both sides and I’d like to think we’ve been very fair here but I do understand people with loans are going to say ‘why isn’t it 0.25 per cent?’.
“We just couldn’t afford to do it.”
WAW Credit Union will make an announcement on its rate changes tomorrow.