A RETIRED accountant who helped set up a ‘community bank’ has received his MBE at Buckingham Palace.

A RETIRED accountant who helped set up a ‘community bank’ has received his MBE at Buckingham Palace.

Brian Curtis (64) met Prince Charles during the ceremony last month and said that it had been a fantastic day with his family.

‘We managed to get hold of an extra ticket, which is very hard, but it meant my wife and three children could come to the palace,’ said Mr Curtis. ‘It was a great weekend and Prince Charles was charming.’

Mr Curtis was awarded the MBE for his role in creating Community Savings & Credit, a financial institution known to everyone as the ‘community bank’.

As well as being chairman of the company, which was set up as a banking service for the disadvantaged, Mr Curtis also provides a mentoring service to customers, using his 40 years of banking experience to offer advice.

‘The only difference is that we can’t issue cheque books or credit cards,’ he said.
‘It is similar to a thrift club but we are regulated and we have fidelity insurance. All profits go back to the members.’

It took five years to negotiate the tricky legal process of setting up the company and Mr Curtis was delighted to be recognised for his efforts with an MBE.

‘Trying to get started in Jersey is very difficult,’ he said. ‘It was a nightmare and three lawyers could not figure it out at first, so the MBE is very rewarding.’

The majority of the company’s 200-odd customers are on income support and Mr Curtis said he wanted to see more people coming to them for help, especially in the current financial climate.

‘We want to get out into the parishes,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to become commercial but we want to be self-sufficient.’