Making a world of difference
CREATING OPPORTUNITIES
Corporate Citizenship at GE Money is about creating opportunities for our employees, our customers, and our neighbors around the world to become fuller participants in the economy and society.
By providing access to financial products and services that are simple, clear, and transparent, we increase economic opportunity. And by using our channels to customers and our relationships with not-for-profits to provide financial education, we leverage our business positioning to help people better understand financial products. Understanding leads to better decisions. Better decisions help improve people's lives.
Whether a mortgage for a first-time homebuyer... a credit line for home improvement... sales finance to buy a car or refrigerator... or a credit card that can be used at millions of establishments around the world... our products can be the foundation of the financial well-being of our customers, their families, and their businesses.
FINANCIAL EDUCATION AND ACCESS
We believe that financial knowledge and the tools to build better finances are key ingredients in healthy communities. This is why our Corporate Citizenship strategy puts a focus on financial education and access.
By financial education, we mean helping people understand financial products and services - things like how banking works, new ways to bank, how to use credit responsibly, and how to get mortgage and home financing. Globally, we sponsor a MoneyBasics program that partners with leading not-for-profit organizations to provide simple, clear, independent information about money. MoneyBasics provides locally relevant, unbiased information to consumers, while also serving as an online clearinghouse for financial information. Examples of these websites can be found at MoneyBasics UK, MoneyBasics Switzerland and MoneyBasics Poland.
We also partner with schools and community centers to support their work in building stronger communities and educating consumers. For example, in Thailand we partner with the Kenan Institute to deliver financial education and business planning through local universities. In Portugal we work with Junior Achievement to teach financial skills to schoolchildren. And in the United States we work with One Economy to improve our online MoneyBasics programs and support local community development initiatives. In addition, each of our MoneyBasics sites is developed in partnerships with stakeholders, including consumer advocacy organizations, NGOs, government, and educational institutions.
In addition to education, GE Money broadens financial access for underserved segments of the population. We do this through our main lines of business and through philanthropic partnerships with not-for-profit or public service organizations. For example, GE Consumer Finance has developed a GE Small Business University which is a series of four modules designed in response to customer voice for GE tools to help small business owners grow their businesses responsibly. The program was successfully piloted at Sam's Club, and will be shared with other customers as desired.
CHARITABLE GIVING AND VOLUNTEERISM
In 2005, GE Money donated more than $3.5 million in more than 25 countries worldwide. This is in addition to $150 million in cash and products given by GE Corporate and the GE Foundation. We also bring the exceptional talent, energy and commitment of more than 55,000 GE Money global employees, many of whom give their time as volunteers in their communities. By sharing their unique skills, our volunteers "give back" to the community while developing a richer understanding of the needs and priorities of the areas where we live and work.
ECOMAGINATION AND GE MONEY
Ecomagination is about taking some of the world's most pressing problems and doing what GE does best: imagining and building innovative solutions that benefit not only our customers but society as a whole. GE seeks to address the needs of a rapidly changing world, with a particular focus on the environment - already, we're delivering cleaner power, solutions to water scarcity and turbines with reduced emissions.
Annually, GE Money sponsors an annual " Ecomagination in the Community" initiative, in which thousands of GE Money employees volunteer to support projects that improve the environment.
At GE Money, Ecomagination goes beyond environmental issues. One of the largest challenges facing the world today is the sustainable economic growth of global societies - we embrace this as our goal. Success depends upon a foundation of financial opportunity, entrepreneurship, financial security, and an informed, educated populace - in essence, the keystones of our GE Money Corporate Citizenship strategy.
