Four regional credit unions have come together to establish the all-digital banking cooperative Dora Financial LLC.
The $5 billion-asset Service Credit Union in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, announced in a press release on Tuesday that Dora, which gets its name from credit union pioneer Dora Maxwell and was publicly launched at the 2021 Inclusiv Virtual Conference earlier this month, has a goal of financial inclusion for people with low to moderate incomes who don’t currently use mainstream banking services. (Inclusiv is the new name of the National Federation of Community Development Credit Unions.)
The other three credit unions that helped establish Dora are Affinity Plus Federal Credit Union in Saint Paul, Minnesota, which has $3.5 billion of assets; Digital Federal Credit Union with $9.8 billion of assets in Marlborough, Massachusetts; and USALLIANCE Financial in Rye, New York, which has $2 billion of assets. Dora checking account deposits are held at USALLIANCE.
"We want to change how people think about access to affordable and fair financial services," Kristi Kenworthy, managing director of Dora, said in the release. "Fifty million Americans are not participating in mainstream banking services because of barriers to opening, distrust of the banking system, gaps in awareness, past history or lack of access, including the lack of a fully bilingual digital banking experience."
The Dora mobile banking app can be used in English or Spanish. It provides consumers with access to a checking account free of minimum balance requirements and monthly service fees.
"Supporting the communities we serve, improving financial well-being and creating enduring relationships is at the heart of what we do,” David Araujo, president and CEO at Service CU, said in the release. “At Service Credit Union, we understand that financial service isn't one-size- fits-all. We are excited, through Dora, that we will be able to extend our impact in order to provide a trusted financial partner for people in our community who need it the most.”
