Cracker for One Day

12 December 2023

December 12th is known as 'Cracker for One Day' at RBL and is something we acknowledge every year as it keeps us on our CX toes.

About 6 years I was visiting a client and staying over at a lovely hotel set outside the town in lovely open grounds.

With it being almost Christmas, the team were flat out and so I decided that rather than heading out for dinner with me, we should all go home on time. I was tempted by room service and a film. I wasn't driving so had accepted a lift from one of the staff members who lived locally.

When I checked into the hotel, I was advised there was no room service offering, only restaurant service that night. The local taxi service was very busy and there were no taxi's available for over an hour.

So, I headed down to the restaurant.

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The Value of Lived Experience and Experiential Labs: Bridging the Gap in Understanding Vulnerable Circumstances

13 October 2023

This week’s blog comes to you on World Sight Day and at the end of Arthritis Awareness Week 2023. Whilst there are many organisations raising awareness of sight loss or visual impairment or living with arthritis who we wholeheartedly support, we have found that simply telling people about a vulnerable circumstance of set of characteristics of vulnerability doesn’t always garner the understanding and empathetic responses firms may be hoping for. Sharing information and experience delivers a more long-lasting and impactful outcome and so we use a combination of techniques in our work with organisations looking to better understand vulnerability. We’ve created a set of Info Cards which share key stats and facts about living with various conditions (all sourced from the NHS), but we also utilise lived experience and experiential labs. In this blog, we will explore the significant value of using lived experience and experiential labs to improve awareness and understanding of vulnerable circumstances.

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The Rising Cost of School Uniforms in the UK: An Unaffordable Necessity

04 September 2023

It’s that time of year in England when social media news feeds are filled with pictures of children standing by their front doors wearing their school uniform as they head back to school. But those uniforms have been causing me concerns.

Earlier in the summer, I read this BBC news article about Parent’s giving up their family holiday, due the need to save for school uniform costs. This article reports that parents are spending approximately £422 on Secondary, and £287 on Primary uniforms – not including branded items which cost more. As mum to three children, the rising cost of school uniforms has not escaped me.

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Our latest infographic – Financial Vulnerability in the UK - published as Consumer Duty goes live

31 July 2023

Consumer Duty from the Financial Conduct Authority is now in place, so it seems like the appropriate time to share our latest infographic about the uphill climb faced by many vulnerable customers experiencing financial vulnerability in the UK. The FCAs’ Financial Lives survey from May 2022 showed a significant increase in the number of UK adults experiencing low financial resilience – up to “1 in 4 (24%) of all UK adults who could quickly find themselves in difficulty if they suffer a financial shock”. The FCA advised that “this result is much worse that we recorded in our February 2020 Financial Lives survey”.

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