HOLLYWOOD, Calif. — Strikes in various branches of the nation's entertainment industry have not really impacted the members of credit unions established to serve that niche.
Two credit unions that have actors guilds and unions as parts of their fields of membership report that strikes, which closed down much of Broadway's live theater for 18 days in November and continue to darken most of the creative part of Hollywood, have not yet led many of their members to seek special help.
In New York, the $91 million Actors Federal Credit Union did put a short-term emergency loan in place to help members who might have been affected by the 18-day strike of stagehands with contracts at many of the Broadway theaters. But the relatively short strike meant that few members needed to use those loans.
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These short-term emergency loans were available for up to $5,000 at the rate of 6.9% for up to 36 months. "We realized that taking on additional loan payments while income is diminished required additional action from the credit union," explained Actors CEO Jeff Rodman. "Because of this, there is no interest or payments for the first three months of our emergency loans."
Actors also put a program called "skip-a-payment" into place to help members better manage their payment situations in case of a longer strike.
The Writers Guild, by contrast, remains on strike in Hollywood for about eight weeks now, but a credit union which serves their union says that so far there has not been very much demand for its strike-related products.
"We have a couple of lines of credit that members can use as well as short term loans of $5,000 that they can defer payments on," explained Mark Jacoby, CEO of the $80 million Musicians Interguild Credit Union, headquartered in Hollywood. "But so far there has not been much demand as the members have been drawing on savings," he said, adding that demand for credit union strike products might increase as the work stoppage continued.
Jacoby observed that the credit union had put a means in place to extend payments on existing loans to members without having too many procedures to go through. "We expect that our members will let us know if they are looking at any strike-related difficulty," he said.
Jacoby said he didn't know why so few of the credit unions' members had needed help so far, especially from the estimate of the strike's impact that he had read in the media. "All I can think is that our members knew this would be a long one and were prepared for it," Jacoby said.
Musicians formed the Interguild Credit Union in 1954. The credit union merged with a credit union serving writers in 2006, Jacoby explained. It also serves many other branches of the entertainment industry but Jacoby reported that not many of those members have sought out the credit union's assistance yet.
Jacoby estimated that the tipping point in the strike might come if the work stoppage continues into late January or February.
He also estimated that the credit union might not have penetrated the guild's membership sufficiently to see the full impact from the strike. "It also maybe that our members are more financially astute because they are our members," he said, explaining that most of the credit unions writing members had proven themselves to be financially responsible. Since the beginning of the strike, Jacoby reported that only one member declared bankruptcy, but added that the member had sought the credit union out to recommit himself to repaying his debt.
"There may be more trouble in the future," Jacoby said, "but so far there hasn't been too much going on with the strike."
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