New approaches to banking for the older old

At the time of the 2001 census there were 2.4m people aged 80 or more in the UK. Life expectancy at age 80 is now 9 years for men and 11 for women. They have experiences very different from the age cohorts that follow them and many do not use the banking facilities that their children take for granted. Many depend very much more on cash transactions than younger cohorts.There are several potential reasons for the large number of the older old who do not have access to conventional bank accounts. Some of these reasons would seem to be conceptual, such as the fear of losing control of a limited budget represented purely as abstract numbers that are only accessible electronically. Our solutions, inspired by detailed study of this extraordinary user cohort, will consider how one might reconnect the digital and physical worlds in ways that solve these conceptual problems. As just one example, imagine a wallet shaped foldable display. One half would display recent transactions with dates and amounts, the other half your current balance, as a figure and an analogue quantity. To keep the interface simple this device would only be used to see your account. The transactions themselves would be carried out at an ATM, via the telephone or whatever and would have immediate effects on the displays.Other reasons for financial exclusion are more practical than conceptual, e.g., inability to get to a branch or to satisfy the regulations for opening new accounts. Home banking could solve some of these problems but here there are additional difficulties due to the way the technology works. The older old were never required to use computers at work and so have little familiarity with techniques for interacting with digital technology. The notion of a password or selecting from auditory or visually presented menus is foreign to many of them. The project will seek to understand these problems from the user's point of view and hence provide user-centred solutions to these more practical problems.The project will involve working with the older old and their representatives, also the providers of financial services. It will consider wider societal concerns such as financial abuse. The methods used will include conventional field study techniques such as interviews, focus groups and role play, also new participatory design techniques based around low cost but high fidelity concept designs. For example, our participants might be invited to use realistic simulations of financial services based around a device of the kind described above. They then take part in a design workshop the output of which will be used to formulate more complete and practical solutions. These solutions will take the form of new financial products and technology to support them.

Dissemination to research users is the objective of WP5 (see Case for Support) and will be lead by the project PI with help from our user partners, Age Concern and Help the Aged, and Barclays bank. The project PI, Monk has considerable experience of presenting research results to commercial and third sector organisations through his work as Director of CUHTec. The primary user beneficiaries of this work will be will be the older old and the financial service providers that generate more inclusive products for them based on our results. For the older old, the products inspired by this work will overcome current practical and conceptual barriers to take up. The financial service providers will gain a new customer group. The increased take up of bank accounts by the older old could potentially reduce government costs when paying pensions and benefits. The other commercial beneficiaries will be companies that manufacture mobile and home technologies and ATMs. Both CUHTec and Culture Lab have good contacts with relevant companies in these areas. However, we expect the lead towards real impact to come from financial service providers. As made clear above the older old are extraordinary users who by challenging the assumptions underlying current banking facilities will provide general insights about how other digitally excluded groups and mainstream users, in the UK and internationally, may be helped to access the digital economy. The research thus has great potential to benefit other users groups. In addition, this project has the potential to radically improve the usability of technological interfaces with banking services to the benefit of financial service providers through improved take up and shorter learning curves. If the products envisaged here were to attract even a small proportion of the current 4 million people receiving benefits via a Post Office Card Account there would be considerable opportunities for technology providers. To ensure that this opportunity is taken up we have user partners who will guide the work from its inception and ensure that the results are in a form that are useful to these commercial concerns and to advise us on how to disseminate them widely. In addition, we hope that they will be some of the first to use our results. Wider dissemination will be achieved by: (i) Provocative physical demonstrations of the product ideas: working prototypes for certain financial transactions; realistic printed sales leaflets describing financial services, and short YouTube style videos. These demonstrations will be exhibited at (ii) and (iii) below and at venues such as relevant conferences and the Barclays flagship branch at Canary Wharf. (ii) An Impact Workshop event held in the studio space at the York Theatre Royal to feature short talks from representatives from user groups external to the project. (iii) Personal invitations to the York Responsive Home issued to key members of the research user constituencies identified above. Here they can view the demonstrations and discuss the research with the investigators.