Pharmacy deal good medicine for Bendigo
Guild Insurance and Financial Services has signed an agreement with Bendigo Bank to distribute retail banking through its 5,000 pharmacies.
Guild Insurance and Financial Services has signed an agreement with Bendigo Bank to distribute retail banking through its 5,000 pharmacies.
Bendigo group managing director Rob Hunt says the strategic alliance with the com-mercial arm of Pharmacy Guild Australia will initially focus on developing products to service the financial needs of Guild's 5,000 member pharmacists.
"Over time, we will look to provide, through selected pharmacies, retail banking services to those communities in which there is a demonstrated need for a banking solution and where there is no other option provided by Bendigo Bank or any other banking provider," Hunt says.
The alliance follows the Guild's aborted GuildBank initiative with the Bank of West-ern Australia. Guildbank was to provide BankWest banking facilities at Guild mem-ber pharmacies, boosting BankWest's penetration in the eastern states. However the deal was broken off in September last year, with the bank saying the two parties could not agree "on the best way forward".
Guild Insurance and Financial Services currently provides insurance and investment products to Pharmacy Guild members.
The banking services including credit facilities will be launched in Victorian pharma-cists in June, with state-by-state roll-outs to follow.
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