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IN TOUCH 鈥� Banks and ATMs; Assistive Tech for Work

TX:听 05.10.2021听 2040-2100

PRESENTER:听 听听听听听听听听 PETER WHITE

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PRODUCER:听 听听听听听听听听听 BETH HEMMINGS

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White

Good evening.听 Tonight, is it getting harder to deal with your money if you have sight problems?听 Some of you are telling us that it is and so now is the consumer advocate Which.听 And a user鈥檚 guide to the technology we鈥檙e told could help us get jobs.

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Clip

When it comes to being a shop assistant it would seem there鈥檚 a useful piece of kit on the market to help blind and visually impaired people cash in.听 It鈥檚 a talking till.听

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Welcome cashier one.听 Three, five, zero.听 Three pounds and 50 pence menswear, 拢10 to pay.

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White

But first, some of your messages to us arrive in sudden bursts of irritation or, less often, approval, others in a steady stream.听 And no stream is steadier than complaints about banks.听 The closing of branches, failure to understand our communication needs, telephone services with long delays in answering followed by interminable questions when you do get through and the perception that everything is now geared to persuading people to go online.

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Here鈥檚 a sample of what we鈥檝e been receiving from you lately.

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Email from listener

My relative does not use email herself or access any online services.听 She can manage to view documents either in large print or with a magnifier.听 I complained on her behalf in 2020 because the covid situation was also preventing either of us from visiting a branch.听 The only answer I got from our bank was to sign up to something called a savings watch, an online alternative.听 I鈥檝e tried again this year by contacting them via Facebook, still I get the same reply.听

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White

And this from someone who did try to go online.

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Emails from listeners

The whole process of getting this sorted out has been ludicrous.听 We applied at the beginning of February and I was told that they would accept forms filled in electronically.听 Then it took months for the forms to be sent on to the right team.听 Then we were sent information which was not accessible, even though I鈥檇 told the bank about our access needs 鈥� info in braille, large print and electronic format.听 A couple or so months after this we were sent audio card readers and 10 weeks later, we鈥檙e still waiting for pin numbers and cards to use with the card readers to arrive with info in accessible formats.听 So, now it鈥檚 over seven months since we first applied for internet banking.

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I am severely sight impaired and live alone.听 I do not have access to a suitable computer and software.听 I used to use my bank鈥檚 telephone system on my handset.听 This changed, last year, and is totally unsuitable.听 I find that in most cases contacting not only banks but most companies you鈥檙e told to go on the internet.听 There never seems to be a way of short-circuiting this by using a telephone keyboard and opting to speak to a human being not a robot.听 It makes me feel that companies are hiding behind the lockdown to avoid speaking to customers.

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White

Well, that鈥檚 an admittedly unscientific samples of emails to us.听 But the consumer advocate Which has conducted a survey talking to around 1500 disabled people and they seem to have come to rather similar conclusions.听 Joining me is Gareth Shaw, who is Head of Money for Which.听

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Gareth, what did your survey find?

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Shaw

Well four in 10 disabled customers told us that bank branch closures had a negative impact on their ability to access banking services.听 They reported issues dealing with online banking, that was particularly a challenge for this group 鈥� one in 10 said they found it difficult to navigate their bank鈥檚 website, one in five said it was difficult to navigate their way around their bank鈥檚 security measures.听 But it wasn鈥檛 just digital banking that they had problems with, there was telephone banking as well, as one of your case studies was saying.听 A quarter of disabled customers told us that they found it difficult speaking to their bank over the phone.听 For people with visual impairments that was around one in four said they found it difficult to speaking to their bank on their phone.

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White

Now your figures, I think, they show we鈥檝e lost 46% of bank branches between 2015 and 2021, which equates to two branches a day over those six years.听 What, in particular, are people telling you about how this affects them, especially visually impaired people?

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Shaw

The branch network has changed radically over the past five or six years.听 As you were saying, we have seen a 44% cut in the network.听 Around two fifths of people said that they鈥檝e suffered because of the closures.听 And the thing is even those that try and resist it, find that they can鈥檛 get what they need from the alternative methods of banking.听 So, digital banking becomes a challenge, telephone banking becomes a challenge.听 But the reduction in branch access has been particularly challenging for this group of people.

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White

And, I guess, the trouble is there鈥檚 a bit of a double whammy here about cash isn鈥檛 there because if you can鈥檛 go to your branch and perhaps people are also finding that ATMs are rather thinner on the ground?

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Shaw

There has been a reduction in the ATM network, that鈥檚 absolutely true.听 Reflective of the change in payment behaviour 鈥� people are using cash less, therefore maintaining that infrastructure becomes more expensive.听 But when we鈥檙e in areas where your bank branch was where your ATM was and they disappear completely, that does create challenges for people when it comes to access to cash.听 There are 10 or 11,000 post offices around the country that people can carry out basic banking business but people have told us they鈥檙e not always comfortable doing that, they don鈥檛 see that as a suitable alternative to a bank branch and therefore perhaps unwilling to engage with their finances in such a setting.

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White

Well, we鈥檒l come back to that issue of ATMs.听 We did invite UK Finance on to the programme, they represent the UK鈥檚 banks, no one was available.听 They have sent us this statement: 鈥淭he financial services industry鈥︹�� they say, 鈥溾��is constantly working to improve access to banking for visually impaired customers including through talking ATMs, cards and statements with braille markings and mobile banking apps that use voice and touch recognition.听 But technology is not for everyone鈥︹�� they go on to say, 鈥溾��and bank branches continue to play an important role in the life of local communities.听 Meaning decisions to close them are never taken lightly.听 Understanding the needs of local communities is vital and the industry supports the Independent Community Access to Cash pilot scheme which is currently trialling and testing different ways to help people to access cash in eight locations around the country.鈥�

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Well, of course, for people who would still prefer to use cash rather than cards there鈥檚 a double problem here.听 We鈥檝e talked about bank branch closures but one alternative, if there isn鈥檛 now a bank near you, would be to go to a cash machine.听 But they are by no means always accessible and, in any case, they鈥檙e disappearing too.听

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Graham Mott is Director of Strategy for Link, they are the UK鈥檚 largest cash machine network.听 Graham, I think you have some statistics on this, how fast are ATMs disappearing?

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Mott

In what we鈥檝e seen during the last sort of year or since the start of the pandemic is ATM numbers have reduced overall by about 7%, which is significantly less than the reduction in cash usage itself, so the value of cash, which is coming out of ATMs, is down about sort of 25-28%, what it was before the pandemic and we don鈥檛 expect that to come back.

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White

Why are we losing so many ATMs so quickly, what鈥檚 the thinking behind this?

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Mott

Link connects the various ATMs but there鈥檚 not a central body which places ATMs, so ATMs are there because ATM operators feel they can make money from people using them and banks, obviously, have ATMs in their bank branches.听 So, when bank branches disappear the ATMs in them usually disappear as well, not always, sometimes they鈥檙e retained but usually they disappear.听 And then in other locations some places are proving just not economically viable for ATMs.听 There have been changes, some of those changes may only be temporary, so, for example, some supermarkets you may have seen there were three ATMs, they reduce them to two to enable social distancing, some of those may come back again, so they maybe switched on, some of those may disappear forever and that may not necessarily be an issue because there鈥檚 still two ATMs and there were three, well they鈥檙e not as busy as they were before so there鈥檚 still a suitable access to cash for people in that area.

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White

Can you just tell us, briefly, about this Community Access to Cash pilot, that I mentioned, how will this benefit people?

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Mott

Well, at the moment, it鈥檚 a pilot so what they鈥檙e doing is looking at a variety of different solutions as to what people want and many of these are based around shared facilities.听 So, one of the issues, of course, is that as banks are usually only accessible to customers of that particular bank, so if you鈥檙e a Barclays鈥� customer you can only go to a Barclays branch.听 And so, one of the areas which we鈥檙e looking at, which has been around 鈥� thought about for a long, long period of time is could you have a shared facility where customers from any bank can go to it and use the facilities?听 Now post offices are like that, most bank customers can use a post office counter and so it鈥檚 to see whether that model can be expanded, does it have to be a post office or could it be something else.听 And those shared facilities might, therefore, be economically viable if one bank branch, which was only serving customers of that bank, wasn鈥檛 viable going forward.

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White

Well, listening to all of that is Chris Holmes, now Lord 麻豆约拍s who has sat on something called the House of Lords Select Committee on Financial Exclusion and who is, himself, visually impaired.听

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Lord Holmes, what do you think about this idea of community banking hubs that Graham has just been describing, is this an answer, are these replacements to bank branches?

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Holmes

The community hubs, I think, need to be part of wider solutions.听 I was able to get an amendment through the Financial Services Bill, now Act, earlier this year, to enable cashback without a purchase, so blind and visually impaired people will be able to go to, for example, a local corner shop or their local caf茅 and get cashback without a purchase.听 Again, that鈥檚 not the total solution but it鈥檚 part of an array of solutions which we need because cash still matters and it matters materially to millions.

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White

Just one issue that we鈥檝e not talked much about but was mentioned in our emails 鈥� how practical is online banking for visually impaired people?听 Some people do it very successfully don鈥檛 they?

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Holmes

Unquestionably, digital is the future, but that future needs to be accessible, it needs to be inclusive and crucially, crucially the transition to that digital future needs to be accessible and inclusive.听 Much, much more work needs to be done to enable blind and visually impaired people and indeed to enable all people to have that accessibility and that inclusivity.听 And even when we get to that point cash will still matter, people will still prefer to use it and also, I think, the government needs to really strongly consider whether they have cash as part of critical national infrastructure and also to legislate for a universal service obligation for cash.

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White

And yet people talk rather glibly about the cashless society, as if it鈥檚 just one of those things we鈥檇 better get used to.听 Has anyone really thought about how that might affect blind people and indeed, are there examples where it鈥檚 almost happened already?

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Holmes

There are some key international comparatives 鈥� Sweden would be the most obvious.听 By a specific date, by the 24th March 2023, Sweden will be a cashless society.听 And they have some good technology in the mix, they have thought about it in a number of ways but there still remains this key question of inclusion, of accessibility and enabling the comfort and the confidence to every citizen to be able to transact and fully participate in that society.听 If we do nothing, in the United Kingdom, cash will go off a cliff face and it will leave, potentially, between five and eight million people in extraordinarily difficult circumstances and a considerable number of those people will be blind and visually impaired.

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White

Sobering thoughts.听 Lord Holmes, thank you very much indeed and also my thanks to Graham Mott and Gareth Shaw.

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Now regular In Touch listeners will, by now, be only too familiar with the fact that only 鈥� just over one in four visually impaired people of working age actually have a job.听 Whenever we cover this, someone is always bound to mention the ever-growing range of technology available using speech and magnification to close the information gap.听 The trouble is making both job seekers and prospective employers aware of what鈥檚 available is difficult.听 Which is why, this week, we鈥檝e asked Fern Lulham at least to scratch the surface of some of the equipment which could be of help.

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Lulham

Special equipment is starting to make more things possible than ever before and I was keen to explore the types of technology which might enable us to work in all kinds of different industries.

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Synthetic speech

Opening documents folder.

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Lulham

Although voice technologies, such as screen readers, may seem like old news to people with low vision, it is a very important tool for employers to be made aware of, as it can make so many different kinds of onscreen work possible for someone who has little or no sight.听 For example, lawyers needing to read legal documents; computer programmers using coding or even me, in my own work, as a radio reporter.听 I鈥檓 able to use both magnification tools and voiceover assistance to help me edit the interviews and audio I collect.

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Synthetic speech

Play.

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Lulham recording

A career perhaps not commm 鈥� commonly [laughing] 鈥� commonly 鈥� oh god.

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Lulham

Right, so I clearly go wrong there.听 I鈥檓 going to cut.

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Synthetic speech

The lead audio.

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Lulham

And no one will every know.听

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Let鈥檚 move now into the busy bustling office environment.听 Equipment such as electronic magnifiers and braille keyboards have been used for many years to enable visually impaired people to independently complete tasks around the office.听 This might include any role from an admin to a trainer to a manager.听 I was interested to try out the latest update on the new IOS system released recently, which allows the user to take a photo on their mobile device and to have voice technology dictate any text within that picture.听 It sounded really handy for tasks which require reading paperwork.

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I鈥檓 going to write something on this piece of paper and let鈥檚 see if it鈥檒l read it to me.听

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Synthetic speech

This is an important letter.

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Whoa, if it could read my handwriting, it can read anything.

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So, what about retail?听 Well, when it comes to being a shop assistant, it would seem there鈥檚 a useful piece of kit on the market to help blind and visually impaired people cash in.听 Yep, you鈥檝e guessed it, it鈥檚 a talking till, the first of its kind, developed by the WESC Foundation in Exeter.听 Sadly, I was unable to get my hands on one.听 But here鈥檚 what it sounds like as it reads out any messages on its high contrast touchscreen.

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Talking till

Welcome cashier one.听 Three, five, zero 鈥� 拢3.50 menswear, current subtotal is 拢10, 拢10 to pay.

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Lulham

You learn something new everyday, don鈥檛 you?听 And speaking of which, let鈥檚 step inside the classroom.

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School bell

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How possible is it to work as a blind or visually impaired teacher?听 Well, tech鈥檚 got a solution for that too.听 Smartboards are now standard in most classrooms, which has made writing things up for students to copy down easier than ever.听 All you need to do is dictate your notes into a computer and they will appear on the whiteboard screen before your class, as if by magic.

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So, if I hold down this key.听 鈥淗ello class, my name is Miss Lulham.鈥澨� And there it is, in massive writing that even I can read.

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Next up is a firm favourite of mine 鈥� the food and drinks industry.听 Ever fancied being a blind barista?听 Well, with handy little devices like the liquid level indicator, which clips on to the side of any cup or glass and allows the pourer to know when it鈥檚 full by beeping 鈥� why not?

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I鈥檓 going to go very slowly.听 [Pouring noise] [Beep, beep, beep] Oh, oh we鈥檙e there.听 Ah.听 Success.

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And finally, I though I鈥檇 explore a career perhaps not commonly considered for someone with less sight 鈥� photography.听 How easy is it to capture powerful images when you have low vision?听 Well, with apps and built-in accessibility features on smartphones, which can help tell you what鈥檚 in frame through your camera鈥檚 viewfinder, even this isn鈥檛 out of the picture.听 And it was something I definitely wanted to give my best shot.

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Okay, I have my subject, Nancy, the guide dog.听 Sit Nancy, sit, good girl.听 That鈥檚 it 鈥� wait, look at me.

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Synthetic speech

One face.

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Lulham

One face 鈥� yes, it鈥檚 your face.听 That鈥檚 it, keep looking at me.听 One, two, three [click], gorgeous.听

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All in all, it would technology should be changing our professional lives for the better but it can only do that if employers know about it and realise they can apply for financial support using schemes like Access to Work.听 Tech will surely keep advancing and hopefully continue to help us overcome our challenges and break down any barriers to a job we love.

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As for me, I鈥檓 still waiting for Siri to be able to finish off my work on my behalf.

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Hey Siri, put my report together for me.

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Siri

I鈥檓 afraid I can鈥檛 do that.

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Lulham

Well, I guess you can鈥檛 have everything.

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White

Well, I have to warn you, Fern, that if Siri does do that, we鈥檒l have to pay her not you.

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That was Fern Lulham reporting.

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And that鈥檚 it for today.听 We always welcome your thoughts and experiences on anything that we鈥檝e talked about in the programme.听 We鈥檙e particularly keen, at the moment, to hear from people who are only recently losing their sight 鈥� are you receiving the help you need with learning to cope with this new situation and if you鈥檙e still waiting to get help, what effect is it having?

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Email intouch@bbc.co.uk.听 You can leave us a voice message on 0161 8361338 or go to our website bbc.co.uk/intouch where you can download tonight鈥檚 and previous editions of the programme.

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From me, Peter White, producer Beth Hemmings and studio manager Sue Stonestreet, goodbye.