Western Union Announces Plan to Declassify Board of Directors

The Western Union Company (NYSE: WU) announced today that it intends to include in its proxy statement for its 2012 annual meeting of stockholders a management proposal recommending that the Company’s stockholders approve the elimination of the Company’s classified board structure.

If the proposal is approved by the stockholders, declassification of the board will be implemented on a phase-out basis such that directors would start to be elected to a one-year term beginning with the directors elected at the Company’s 2013 annual meeting of stockholders. The full text of the proposal will be included in the Company’s proxy statement to be filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission later this year.

In light of the Company’s plan to declassify its board and its ongoing assessment of whether “proxy access” should be included in the Company’s corporate governance structure, the Company also announced that it no longer intends to submit for stockholder vote at its 2012 annual meeting a management proposal to implement a form of proxy access.