Capturing the voice of older consumers in relation to financial products and services

Abstract

The purpose of this pilot study was to focus on the suitability of selected financial products for older people. Bank accounts and equity release products were selected for this study by an expert advisory panel. New marketing initiatives are being used to promote bank accounts, including forms of insurance, for the '50+' market. Also, older people are now expected to provide for their retirement and it is anticipated that equity release will be one product which may be used to fund and maintain consumer lifestyles. In the first phase of the study, a questionnaire was distributed to 152 people aged over 50 years in Scotland. Eighty-three were completed, a response rate of 55%. The results informed the development of questions for the second phase which were discussed with 46 participants via the World Café in June 2008, enabling a deeper insight into their opinions. The research found that consumers had lost trust in financial product and service providers because of the perceived excessive profits of banks and lack of customer service. Further, many products and services were prohibited for or incurred extra costs to those aged over 60 or 65 years, leaving limited choices, and equity release products were seen as a last resort for those in financial difficulty. Although the profitability of banks has changed dramatically since the completion of data collection, the issues identified by older consumers in Scotland will be of international interest. The demographic changes resulting in an increasing proportion of elderly people in the population are reflected throughout the UK and many Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development countries. Similar financial products and services, which were the focus of this study, are promoted internationally, offering opportunities to replicate the research methods.

The competition for supplier resources

“…The World Café can be regarded as a specialized form of the conventional focus group approach (Brennan & Ritch, 2010). However, it has several advantages over focus group and other approaches such as (semi-)structured interviews.…”

Pension Freedom Day in the United Kingdom: Early evaluation of consumer response

“…In the UK, the number of people of pensionable age for every 1000 people of working age is projected to rise from 310 in 2014 to 370 over the next 25 years, even taking into account the planned increase in state pension age to 67 (U.K. Office for National Statistics, ). The UK government has responded with a series of new pension regulations, resulting in the revision of savings plans and products for the accumulation phase as well as the liberalization of the decumulation phase (for review see Brennan & Ritch, ; Leisering, ).…”

Innovative supply risk management : the development of a comprehensive supply risk management system

“…The world café can be regarded as a special form of focus group research (Brennan and Ritch, 2010;While et al, 2006). In the next section we will next briefly discuss the world café before describing the adaptations we are suggesting.…”

“…The world café method is a special kind of focus group research (Brennan and Ritch, 2010;While et al, 2006). Focus group refers to a group interview in which the interaction of the group participants leads to the development of knowledge (Kitzinger, 1995;Morgan, 1988;Myers, 2009), which is what the world café element of a consortium benchmarking project aims to achieve.…”

“…We suggest to address the clockspeed issue by combining two inclusive research methods, consortium benchmarking (Schiele and Krummaker, 2011) and the world café method (Brown and Isaacs, 2005), a special form of focus group research (Brennan and Ritch, 2010;While et al, 2006). We refer to this combination as "speed consortium benchmarking".…”