4.85%*

Thirty five years ago, several PHI employees would meet each day for their coffee breaks. One day while they were enjoying their friendships over a cup of coffee, the topic of discussion was Credit Unions.

The more they discussed the benefits a credit union could provide to the employees the more excited they became about the possibility of organizing this service for their co-workers.

For guidance and education, they turned to representatives of established credit unions. They graciously agreed to meet with them, after work hours, to share the knowledge they had acquired.

The more they learned the more they became convinced a credit union was the way to go. So on January 10, 1975 the following PHI, Inc. employees applied for and received a charter for the PHI Federal Credit Union: Emile J. "Lou" Guidry, David T. Parsons, Judith Kidder, Jessie P. Chiasson, Alfred A. Ware, Jr., Julia M. Breaux (active), and Voorhies P. Mouisset, Jr.

So with a few members and a few dollars, they were open for business.

In the beginning, the Board was not allowed to conduct any credit union business on company time. Therefore, the meetings were held in the company's conference room after everyone had clocked out from work.

As the credit union grew, they knew we had to open an 8:00 to 5:00 office to better serve the employees. With 2 other credit unions, they rented space in the old Sunbeam Bakery on Cameron Street. However, it didn't take long to realize the location was still an inconvenience to the membership, so the office was moved to a second location on Coolidge Boulevard in the Oil Center. While the Oil Center location provided a closer proximity to PHI, the Credit Union strives for convenience of members and on May 22, 1990, the doors to our current location were opened. Today the PHI Federal Credit Union is within walking distance to the Lafayette PHI facility. Our membership consists of over 1500 members with $5,800,000.00 of assets.

We would like to thank Ms. Julia Breaux for her help with the information provided.