Bradford and Bingley plc is a Britishbank headquartered in the Yorkshire town of Bingley. It was formed by the floatation of the former Bradford and Bingley Building Society in 1999. Previously, as a building society, the Bradford and Bingley was owned by its customers. By floating on the London Stock Exchange, members of the society received free shares worth up to Ł5,000.
The original society was formed in 1842. Today the Bradford and Bingley is one of the United Kingdom's largest mortgage lender. Bradford and Bingley are innovative in their selling, as they also sell other providers mortgages as well as their own.
Bingley is a town in the City of Bradford Metropolitan Borough District, West Yorkshire, England, five miles north west of Bradford.
Bingley was probably founded in Saxon times; certainly its name is Saxon in origin, meaning “Bing's clearing”, though this would not be the original spelling or pronunciation of Bing.
In 1974 the West Riding of Yorkshire was replaced by the new metropolitan county of West Yorkshire and the Bingley Urban District Council was dissolved.