Tennessee Valley Federal Credit Union has been recognized on the Forbes list of America's Best-In-State Credit Unions for 2021, and it received the highest credit union score nationally.
"This designation is incredible and meaningful in that we did not apply or lobby for this result as it was our members who completed the anonymous survey by Statista, which further exemplifies the significance of the results," said Todd Fortner, president and chief executive of Chattanooga-based TVFCU.
The award is presented by Forbes and Statista Inc., a statistics portal and industry ranking provider, according to TVFCU.
To gauge which firms have the most satisfied customers, Forbes partnered with Statista to survey nearly 25,000 people in the U.S. about their banking relationships, TVFCU said.
Consumers were asked 20 questions about their financial dealings. Credit unions and banks were rated on overall recommendations and satisfaction as well as five sub-dimensions - trust, terms and conditions, branch services, digital services and financial advice.
Of the more than 5,000 credit unions nationwide, only 3.6% made the list, according to TVFCU. Of the 5,068 credit unions and 4,978 banks, TVFCU received the highest score in the nation, it said.
"We are extremely humbled to be recognized by Forbes as the Best-In-State Credit Union in Tennessee, and to have the highest survey score of all financial institutions is awesome," said Fortner.
TVFCU has more than 161,000 members in a 13-county service area in Southeast Tennessee and North Georgia. It has more than $2.1 billion in assets and 21 branches throughout the area and its the largest credit union in the region.
Since its creation in 1936 by Chattanooga TVA employees, TVFCU said it was one of the first financial institutions to remove traditional teller lines and implement conversational dialogue branches in the early 2000s.
In 2015, TVFCU was a pioneer of interactive teller machines (ITMs). It has introduced more than 80 ITMs throughout the service area, TVFCU said. In addition to TVFCU's digital services, it also implemented video banking in 2020.
As a member-owned cooperative, TVFCU awarded more than $170,000 to community initiatives in 2020, the company said.