cheque mates: participatory design of digital payments with eighty somethings

Cheque Mates – Vines, Blythe, Dunphy, Vlachokyriakos, Teece, Monk & Olivier

CHI 2012, Austin, TX, 7th May 2012

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Cheque Mates: Participatory Design of Digital Payments with Eighty Somethings

John Vines, Mark Blythe, Paul Dunphy, Vasillis Vlachokyriakos, Isaac Teece, Andrew Monk, Patrick Olivier



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Workshops on designing future banking technologies and services

16 participants; 80-‐87 years of age (eighty

somethings)

12 workshops over 6 months (turnout of between 2 and 6 per workshop)

Cheques (and their demise) were a focal point



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“a paper promise to pay” – See: Cheque and Credit Clearing Company, 2001



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“Poor banks, doesn’t your heart bleed for them. If they just cancelled one person’s bonus, they would have no problems.” -‐ Mary, 81

See: Vines et al. 2012. The Joy of Cheques: Trust, Paper and Eighty Somethings



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Betty: It would have to be a voluntary group would it? Helen: A not for proIit organisation, yes ... You set that up and we’ll all come. Anna: I think you should go into partnership you two. Ruth: That would be one in the eye for the banks if you went independent. Let’s join John’s bank.

“I don’t see that working.” “It seems so complicated. It’s so easy just to have a bank account.” “One more hassle.” “I don’t think that’s very practical because there aren’t that many Age Concern branches and if you live in the country or somewhere.” “No”



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COMMUNITY ‘CHEQUE MATES’

Participant is given a £20 Cheque book

‘Encouraging’ friends, family, traders, etc into accepting

Payee writes account number, Sort-‐code and name on rear

Post it to me, and I perform an online payment to payee



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4 Participants

Cheques ‘paid in’ by: newsagent; window cleaner; yoga teacher; neighbours;

grandchildren



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“[She] absolutely slaughtered me. I mean, they’re … friends really, I thought. But you know … “Mike’s not having anything to do with this. He wouldn’t be caught by a scam like this. You’ve picked the wrong person here.” And I said, “Hey, hang on! This isn’t a scam, as I explained. It’s a proper university research project.” – “I don’t care what it is. We have to have a written guarantee of what’s going to happen to all these details. He wouldn’t write all this on the back, and he’s so careful when he does this, that and the other.” -‐Iris, 81



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Participants engaged with the idea…

Most payees accepted the cheques and sent them to the

‘clearing house’

Writing down bank details on the rear is experienced as a

large security risk

This is made a larger concern when the ‘bank’ is unknown

Entering in multiple payments online one-‐by-‐one is very time

consuming



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“Yes you see if I’ve written a cheque or the equivalent of a cheque on that paper and I give it to the plumber for the boiler …. He gives it into his bank or he could send it direct to […] the clearing centre and then because that’s authorised on my paper then they can instruct my bank to pay his bank.” -‐ Agatha, 81



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DIGITAL ‘CHEQUE MATES’

look, feel, used like a cheque ; authorise box ; keep the ‘cheque’



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DIGITAL ‘CHEQUE MATES’

look, feel, used like a cheque ; authorise box ; keep the ‘cheque’ ; self-‐contained ; ‘safe’



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“I’ve got this as a stub to know what I’ve done. As opposed to it being electronic and on a computer, which I could knock off by accident at any time, or anything. It’s all here on paper… That impresses me, absolutely.”

-‐ Patricia, 82



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“When you read the instructions, it has you a bit dumbfounded, but when you get down to [it], it’s quite simple to use.” -‐ Margaret, 82

“you need a PhD to use this!” -‐Iris, 82



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technology that preserves, rather than replaces

dialogue lead to mutual change

responding to the challenges ; questioning their criticisms



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Thank You! (again)

Please come to our SIG: “Participation and HCI: Why Involve

People in Design?”

Thursday : 1130-‐1250 : Room 11A