Piggybank, personal banking

PiggyBank, VFL/ Sustain our nation/ Audi Design Foundation/

sustain our

nation

Joseph Smith Process Booklet.Piggybank. VFL

S VisualisingFinances

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This process booklet aims to give you an insight into how the project has progressed thus far, and to give you an insight into the methods and process I have been going through.

Summary/ Key points.

- PiggyBank aims to provide more tangible and understanable methods of budgetting.

-PiggyBank can link all of your accounts in one manageable software making budgeting more understandable.

- The service is spread over three levels expressing different levels of information.

- Each of these levels could be used in conjunction with one another, or could be applied as a singular service.

- The information is provided in a graphically engaging manner.

- PiggyBank allows the user to set long term fi nancial goals and actively encourages saving for them.

Going Forward.

- To build live fl ash prototypes so I can test the service on people and gain further insights.

- Opportunities to focus the project in a specifi c area, and include a local community or group.

- Consult a graphic designer on the information layout, and possible alternatives for visualisation.

- To explore the possibility of including businesses within a local area in the service. Users could monitor how well local independent stores are doing, and may support them.

Transparency

Visualisation

“Saving up”

Alternative Credit Systems

ValuePerceptions

Long Term vs.

Short term

Tangibility

Community/LocalFinance

Finance:

Knowledge Information

IdeasReputation

GDP Measurements

Electronic

Gold Services

Banking

OnlineCredit Cards

Terminology

Trust

RedemptionSharing

RumourChinese whispers

Announcements

Culture of debtNot borrow

New things

Time

Services

Living beyond means

Indulgence

Discipline

Equality

Investment

PassionHealth

ComplicatedIntangible

Access

Customise

Clear

Understandable

openess

SustainableRiskGrowthBudget

trade

Initial Brainstorming/Opportunities and interests:

Initially it was important to understand current themes, trends, and issues related to fi nance and the fi nance industry.

Because the industry and the word covers such a vast range of topics, and can oft en be extremely complex it was a good idea to fl ush out potential avenues of inter-est and opportunity very early.

Through very fl uid and rough brainstorming I began to generate areas of interest and try to see patt erns emerg-ing in these areas. I cast my net wide in order to under-stand any possible opportunities.

I found that fi nances and the fi nance industry has had a steady progression towards more digital media with the advent of electronic transfers, internet banking, and the purchasing with card, now even contactless payments.

This movement seemed to be an interesting area be-cause through talking with people it seemed that these changes, although extremely convenient and making life more effi cient, also made keeping track of what was being spent rather diffi cult during the spending process. There was no immediate feedback.

Also when I thought about the new services brought about by the digitalization of fi nance it seemed that platforms such as internet banking could, and should allow the individual more control over there funds, and be more engaging.

I saw that the issues surrounding tangibility, transpar-ency, and visualisation were all linked and were inter-esting areas to look at collectively, as there was a clear patt ern there.

Joseph Smith. Visualising Finances.

S

Government

Banking

Consumers

tierof

debt

Irresponsible lendingShort termBonus CultureEarly Retirement- quick wealthQuick Fix

Mass SpendingBritish National DebtGovernment Borrowing“Spend our way out”MP’s Expenses

Mass ConsumerismEntitlement to borrowPersonal Responsibility

The Wider Context/UK Today, Our Culture of Debt.

Through research into the current economic climate in Britian today many things were abundantly obvious. The current economic recession is largely blamed on the banking sector for irresponcible lending, and the media has used them as a scapegoat for the current turmoil. However I felt it was important to address some more wider issues. Throughout society within the UK there is a worrying tier of debt that cascades through it.

Government Level:The government largely blame the banks for the current economic downturn, however there own borrowing in terms of our national debt aswell as the expenses can-dals are testiment to there responsibility also. Surely the government has more infl uence on its people than bankers, and should be sett ing a bett er example to its people.

Personal Level: Despite the banking there is still as desire in the UK to borrow more than you can aff ord. The trend of living beyond your means is so inherant now it has almost beome acceptable.

If you look back through British hitory however even only as far back as 30- 40 years ago the att itudes to-wards personal debt and borrowing was far diff erent.There was quite a stigma att ached to living beyond your means or borrowing money.

Also people were able to manage their own fi nances and took personal responcibility in doing so, oft en with the head of the house budgett ing the funds etc. Saving up and budgett ing almost have a stigma att ached to them today. How could this be changed?


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KnowledgeSharing InformingBlogs, reviews, sending links

Health

Friends

Ebay ratingsUser reviews ect.

Networkssocial networkingconnectionsbusiness links

CommunityContributionFacilitating local community

Passion

Information

ServicesTime Money

ConsumptionProduction ParticipationIndustrial revolutionManufacturing based industryRaw materials/ Primary

Consumption based economySpending to increase wealthService based economyMass consumerism

FutureValuing/ measuring more than moneyContribution you make to society

Historic ways of Valuing.

Movement of our economy/Systems of Value and Reward.

What could we value in the future?

Through my initial research a strong theme within fi annce and business at present is the idea of creating economies based on participation, what you off er.

We have moved from a production based economy, to a consumption based economy, and the next step is widely believed to be a movement into a participation based economy. Therefore learning to value more than money will be extremely important in this shift .

Therefore I wanted to understand what could be deemed as valuable in a participation economy, and the possible ways value would be established and rewarded.

Taking into account global issues such as climate change, aging populations, healthcare issues etc I started to map out possible connections and areas of our lives that provide us value, and then thinking about how this could be translated to be part of our fi ance industry.

This was formulated based on ideas discussed in Time Magazine, Business week, and Fortune.

Reputation



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Managing Money/ Budgeting/How we manage money in the modern age?

Understanding how much money we have and being able to manage funds perhaps should be easier than ever with the access

However with the increase in technology, sitt ing down and working out your fi nances oft en doesn’t happen, and with the

Over a series of discussions with people I got an un-derstanding of how people managed their fi nances and how they understood there money. I specifi cally chose people within diff erent age ranges and backgrounds to get a broader range of results.

Findings/ Observations:

Electronic Transfers:

Wages are now almost always paid to employees through electronic transfers. When wages were paid weekly and in an envelope people have indicated that it was easier to manage and understand what you had because you could see the funds diminishing.

Credit/ Debit Cards:

The act of paying for things is becoming more easy, and the interaction between “buying things”, and actually paying is being lost. There is no immediacy to a card payment.

Levels of Financial Information

Basic Level/Quick, Immediate, Rough, Unspecific

People dont always want to know detailed breakdown

enough to go out for a night, or to buy a DVD, rather than analysing their banking.

Medium Level/Sensible Spending, Balances, Limits

To ensure that a person can take control and understand their finances and the amounts they are spending there needs to be a seamless availablility of that information, to try and slow the pace of impulsespending.

Detailed High Level/Planning, Assessing, Analysing

Planning and being able to assess how and where you spend your money is vitally important to budgetting and living within your means.

Tim

e L

ev

els



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UKForex Trading Room Visit/Looking to extremes: Visualisation.

I spent a number of aft ernoons in the UKForex LTD dealing room in London. It was a chance to get to see how they worked and understand how they monitored and maintained the companies fi nances in a highly charged environment.

The amounts going through the company are extremely large and therefore an enormous amount of care is taken. They are precise and accurate, and are aware of what is going on within diff erent markets and curren-cies at all times.

They have the tools to do this however, and the way in which they visualise and understand money is extreme-ly interesting.

Observations:

- Using Colour to indicate quick changes in the mar-ket. So any drops were indicated in red, and any gains in green, on what was otherwise a colourless display. Draws their att ention quickly.

- Visuals can be quickly assesed just by a glance to un-derstand both long term, and short term performance of a paticular currency pair over a period of time.

- Live seamless displays allow them to monitor accounts , markets and specifi c trades.

- Use a range of diff erent methods for diff ering levels of information, and use diff erent technology to access this.

‘After a while you do not really think so much about the amounts you are dealing with, it becomes second nature, but its definitely nerve wracking at first, but it becomes a “smallish” deal could be 100k, you know.’

Become disconnected from the valueof money.

Alex Edwards. Seniour Corporate Dealer

‘We understand what is going on, the size and colour of the information can

draw our attention quickly, and then wecan analyse any changes that need to be made.’

Chris Humphrey. UK Manager Ozforex Group Visualising changes and movements


‘Its really useful to have as it gives us very quick indications on what is happening and draws our attention to things very quickly.’

Chris Humphrey. UK Manager Ozforex Group

Being able to quickly analyse the stateof your account, and drawing attention to potential problems.

‘I mean the graphs are really useful to see things over the long term, so we can then advise on trends.’

Seperating short term movements or patterns and long terms and visualising them could be useful.

Alex Edwards. Senior Corporate Dealer

‘Its alot of money, understanding whats going in and out is essential so we can hedge our positions, if we dont do it we dont make any money.’

Chris Humphrey. UK Manager Ozforex Group

UKForex Trading Room Visit/Looking to extremes: Visualisation.

Play. Exploration Document/

Play. Exploration Document/ Sustain our nation/ Audi Design Foundation/

What if your card ran hot?

What if bankingwas like

gardening?

What happenedto saving up?

What if bankingwas like making

music?

How could banks encourage sensible spending

and saving?

What if yourcard was like achocolate bar?

SNAP OFF

What if bankershad to physicallymove the money

for trades?

What if you could charge your

cardwith amounts?

What if a bankersinvestments wererepresented by a plant or bonzai?

What if you could pay usingfluids- blood etc?

How could we educate children

about saving?

How can wemake electronicpayments more

tangible?

What if?How could?

What if the system

had colapsed?You are your

Banker!

What if internet banking

was more engaging?

How can wemotivate finance

staff without bonuses?

DEBIT/ CREDIT CARDS.

- Add an aspect of tactile,physical feedback to raiseawareness when spending

- Prevent "going out of hand"somehow?- Increase mid-/long-term visualisaition of spending oncredit card- Using the spending history to show account health on eachspending

- No immediate (physical) feedback and therefore less awareness- Having money with one everywhere lowers thethreshold of buying something- Many people cannot handle credit cards responsibly- Losing the card and details- Security issues

Strengths

Weaknesses

Opportunities

- Building up debt- Giving out behavioural data to companies- Linkage to biometric identity can be negative

- Becoming even less tangible

Threats

- No cash money to carry with you- Stealing the card does not necessarily mean loss of money- Great for online shopping- Loyalty schemes, collecting points- Immediate purchasing anytime anywhere- Light and thin- Interconnectivity, history


What if? How Could? OpportunitiesSWOT: Strentgths. Weaknesses. Opportunities. Threats.


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Sketches: Ideas around paying for goods.


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2x Belgium BunsTuna Steaks x 2 Troy. Motion Picture (DVD)CucumberVine Rippened TomatoesNescaffe Gold BlendTetleys TeabagsBagguette x 1 LRGWalnut CakePipped Olives 100Ml

TOTAL

Chistlehurst High StBR7 5BU

0.998.60

14.991.251.502.592.240.992.002.99

38.14

11/09/2009 11:33 a.m. 10 itemsTrnsctn 17947

197 a week with no savingsExcluding Direct Debits.

Front. Back.

Financial Breakdown.

Amount Spent. £38.14Account Amount. £800.01Next Pay: 21 Days

CARDHOLDER COPYPLEASE KEEP THIS RECIEPTFOR YOUR RECORDS

Gives you your new accountbalance and time till payday.Immediate feedback on healthof your account.

Provides the three most expensive items on your list so you can analysehow much you are payingand whether there is a cheaper option.

Graphical breakdown of your account, amount vs. time. Showsyou on the timeline any directdebits or standing orders that will come out, and when.

Gives you a weekly amount you have to spend, breaking down

how long till your next payday.

Credit/ Debit Card Ideas and Reciept Feedback/5 Concepts for making paying more tangible.


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Sketching Out Concepts:

I began to sketch out potential service concepts trying to add all the relevant stages and processes the user would go through to obtain, use, and enjoy the service. The photos show processes I used to map out a variety of concepts and ideas, and try to get some fl uency and to-getherness to them, plotting out ideas using mind maps and brainstorms and then getting some fl uency and togetherness by getting things up around me on post its and pictures..

I used post it notes to work my ay through scenarios for services, how they would be purchased, how they would be set up, used, and how that linked with other prod-ucts.

I also used mind maps as a way of pushing the ideas I was having for potential products and services.


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Colour Charts:

Examining how bank statements could be bett er visu-alised to give the user immediately long term and short term indications and information I started looking at colour charts.They can be used to give very quick rapid indications of previous spending habits and could be used to form the basis of a statement.

I think the statement could be much more like a caland-er, not only showing what has gone out, but also what is coming out. I think coulour charts could be one way to indicate account health over periods of time.

12 Month Chart:

Each segment represents a month within the previous 12. Allows you to quickly view which months were particuarly bad, and can then look and assess why that was, and start to fi nd spending patt erns. Each Segment could be further broken down into weeks and then also the activity on the account could also be fi ltered by date, but also by amounts and location so spending habits can be analysed.


Jan Feb Mar

June July Aug

Sep Oct Nov Dec

April

May

1100

0

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

1000

-100

-200

Calendar Ideas:

Ideas based on how the Yearly, Monthly and weekly statements could be broken don to get a quicker insight into your personal fi nance.

Ideas are based around colour charts and graphs. They can quickly give you insights, and are visually under-standable to most people.

Chart/ Calendar

Another way that a statement could be presented would be plott ing them across a line diagram. It is immediately understandable and communicates well with the user visually. The account amounts could be plott ed on the Y axis, and would also include negative amounts to include overdraft facilities, with time being shown along the X axis.

Key Dates could be plott ed on the graphs, with red dots meaning Direct debits or standing orders, and green dots when money goes into account regularly for example payday, familiarising the user with when these payments come out.

Calendar Visualisation Ideas/How statements should be shown in service.


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Information availability/How can information be made available away from the home?

The information a person has on their fi nances needs to be available away from just the internet and the home. The information needs to be available seamlessly outside the home and work in conjunction with the soft ware.

I wanted to explore how a smart phone application could be used within a personal banking service, and how far you could take it. Using research into contact-less payments and the phone becoming a method of payment particularly in Japan, I wanted to see how this could work within my system.

Therefore, I prototyped some screens for the applica-tion and took them to my local supermarket. I discussed with people there what they thought about the diff erent ideas I had.

Wishlist reminders and direct debit reminders were particularly good, as was having some feedback on your phone whilst shopping.

I think that instead of paying using your card which in the UK at present isn’t feasible, the phone can act as a tool to remind you, and also allow you basic account information whilst on the move.


£418.23-£41.25

£918.23+£400£918.23

Desktop Gadget:

Thought about having a gadget to sit on your desktop that gives you immediate live feedback on account bal-ance.

1. Sits on your desktop, and can be set to initiate as you log on.2. It gives a live account balance at that time .3. Immediate and easy understanding by colour . 4. Shows since you last logged on whether your account balance has increased or decreased and the amount by which it diff ers.

Desktop Gadget/Live Account Balances on desktop, and diff erence from last login


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PiggyBank.

Brand/ Company Logo:

Ideas for company and Brand logos. Final Logo to the left, PiggyBank, and above is the logo for the Phone application. The Brand and company name aims to be playful to attract young target market.

Logo Design Ideas/ Company. BrandIdeas, and Final PiggyBank. Logo


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Prototype Building:

The next few pages show the process I went through building a prototype for the physical aspect of the Pig-gyBank service. I experimented and looked into diff erent ways I could create a working prototype to illustrate how the object would work, and built two electromagnetic prototypes, one of which I built and the other made from bought components, that had a much stronger magnet.


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The prototype was built to illustrate how the object would work. The idea is that for quick rough feedback on your account, so you can understand immediately whether you can go out tonight, or buy that jacket, you would shake the object. Your balance is roughly measured in the sound of coins rolling around inside, the more you hear, the more you have.This interaction resembles and mimics the way we shook our piggybanks as children to hear how much we had.

The electronics inside the prototype are made up of an electromagnet, a switch, a batt ery, and a shaker that was cobbled together from bits and pieces. The electro-magnet is secured at the bott om of the shaker, which is made up of pieces of plastic tubing I had to hand. On top of that is two thin pieces of card. Then I placed some nails on top of that and added a lid. When the magnet is off , and the object is shook the nails roll around inside jangling, and when the switch is triggered the magnet comes on and the nails stick so no sound is heard.

Make. Making Document/

Make. Making Document/ Sustain our nation/ Audi Design Foundation/

Who are we?

PiggyBank is a fi nancial service that allows you to interpretand understand your fi nancial information in a more tangible, useful, and recognisable way.

What we do?

The information from your internet banking is read and ana-lysed by Piggybank, and is digested and broken down intomore understandable data presented in a visual format that allows analysis and understanding of spending habits and patt erns. The levels of information required to understand your fi nancial status is broken down over three platforms, the website, the application, and the object.

PiggyBank.

Levels of Financial Information

Basic Level/Quick, Immediate, Rough, Unspecific.

People don't always want to know detailed breakdown of their finances, they just want to know if they have enough to go out for a night, or to buy a DVD, rather than analysing their banking.

Medium Level/Sensible Spending, Balances, Limits

To ensure that a person can take control and understand their finances and the amounts they are spending there needs to be a seamless availability of that information, to try and slow the pace of impulse spending.

Detailed High Level/Planning, Assessing, Analysing

Planning and being able to assess how and where you spend your money is vitally important to budgeting and living within your means

PiggyBank Software/ Web Banking/

PiggyBank software gives the user a platform that is far more

engaging and understandable, and allows many options for managing money currently unavailable.

PiggyBank Application/

The PiggyBank application allows the user to judge how much they are spending, and how much they have whilst on the go.It provides a lighter version of the website software, aimed to

simply understand and view current balances and amounts.

PiggyBank Object/

The physical PiggyBank allows the user to get rough judge-ments on their account balances quickly.

£00.0

0

The physical PiggyBank allows the user to get rough judge-ments on their account balances quickly.

Welcome.

Weve been expecting you.

PiggyBank

PiggyBank.

Talk. Evaluation Document/

Talk. Evaluation Document/ Sustain our nation/ Audi Design Foundation/

Written Project Report/ Analysis:

PiggyBank has evolved from a long process of research, discussion, and experimentation.

Find.

Initially I wanted to digest the subject in its most wid-est form so I tried to immerse myself in the subject. I wanted to look into fi nance through fresh eyes through looking at current trends and themes within the sector.

The two areas that I found most interesting were creating new forms of value, and the intangibility of money.

Through research I began to recognise trends and links between certain subjects and beginning to establish what I felt was most relevant. Through looking widely at the subject I could see very strong links between a number of current discussions and issues within fi nance to do with intangibility, visualisation, understanding, and openness.

The reason for choosing to work on the intangibility of money was because it was an area where I had a large number of ideas very quickly. I identifi ed that technological advances has contributed to removing the customer from the act of spending. I found this area particularly interesting as it would give me a chance to investigate peoples attitudes towards money.

What was extremely infl uential was looking back to how people managed their personal fi nances in the past.Social attitudes towards debt and borrowing in the UK, seemed to have dramatically changed. This made me want to look into readdressing and re-establishing a sense of personal responsibility for your own fi nances, and generate ideas that would make it easier and more engaging to do.

The trips to UKForex LTD really gave the project a lot of focus and direction.

What I observed was that the guys had access to a set of tools that really allowed them to do their job effi ciently, quickly, but also accurately. The levels of information they were getting from the different tools they had to use was something that was really interesting, and something I felt could be used as a starting point for a project. I found the use of colour and scale to draw their atten-tion to things quickly very interesting. I felt this could be transferred to personal fi nance in order to make it more engaging. I also had some ideas that could be applied within a dealing room environment. I was keen to pursue this path initially, as well as focusing on a new generation of bank customers who are being brought up with internet banking and new systems i.e. contactless payments.

They expect to have the technology, so how could I make it more understandable, tangible and useful.The opportunities for projects within this environment, with reference to understanding and making tangible amounts etc I felt could be undertaken either for a dealing environment, or within personal fi nance. Although they are two parallel extremes there was defi nite overlap in many areas.

From a very early stage I was keen to explore my interest in information visualisation in this project therefore I was trying to breakdown all the information gathered in my research into more manageable understandable diagrams. This really helped meto understand links within my research. It made it easier for me to explain my fi ndings and observations to others. It was also an area that I felt could be used within the project. Through the research I had conducted it seemed that the understanding of funds and spending patterns were non existent for a lot of people. Internet banking did not engage them. Therefore more visual, immediately understandable visualisations of their funds could be a positive step.

Play.

Initially I played around with a range of concepts that had been on my mind in relation to credit/ debit cards and making them more tangible, particularly in impulse purchase situations, and also some communication ideas based around receipts- whether your receipts could have more information on. This could give you a breakdown of your account after each purchase, or your card could be a representation of your purchases through printing directly onto it, every purchase leaving a mark. This was fun to think about and gave me some insights allowing me to move forward. What I got from these experiments was that some tangible physical element would be really benefi cial in giving people an understanding of their fi nances.

I also had some ideas about understanding the health of a bank or organisation. These ideas came out of conversations between me and a friends about how before the credit crunch it was impossible in most peoples minds that a bank would fail. So what if outside each bank their garden was a refl ection on how well the bank were doing, or what if you could use augmented reality to point at a bank, if the bank is doing well its in solid gold, if its not its a ruin. These ideas were based on the fact that banks from the outside never look vulnerable and therefore we, as consumers have no idea what could be going on.

I also explored similar ideas where peoples fi nances could be represented by the health of a plant or living thing. One idea was to have a plant inside a incuba-tion case, and the environment was determined by your personal fi nancial responsibility, so depriving it of water and sun if you were doing badly, or the nutrients the plant received could be altered, affecting its colour and appearance. This would give you clear indications as to how you were doing. This I felt could work well in dealing rooms, giving visual indications as to who was performing well etc.

These initial tests got my thoughts clearer about what I where the project could go and I began to generate ideas based on a service to make banking more practical, enjoyable and understandable for people. I wanted a system that gave out different levels of feedback to people. This would allow them to analyse the past, be responsible in the present, and plan for the future.

It was clear that many peoples long term desires to travel, or buy a house or car had been scuppered by short term impulse purchases.

I developed a list of criteria that I thought I needed to meet and began to plot and sketch out scenarios, and how services could work. Using mind mapping I tried to push the idea as far as it could go.

Therefore I decided that it was important to have an aspect of analytical fi nancial information, where the user could also plan. This was more long term. This would come in the form of a piece of software which would take the information held on the users internet banking and translate it into something more understandable and visually stimulating. This would give a better insight into your fi nances. It would also allow the user to set limits on what they could spend over a period of time, helping them budget.Long term goals such as trips, and large purchases could then be established and kept to.

Then I knew there needed to be a similar service away from the home. This would allow you to access more basic information. It would also allow reminders to be sent regarding direct debits. Therefore I thought a lite version of the software could come in the form of a smart phone application.

Finally there needed to be something within the home that could give quick rough indications about your personal fi nance. This object would need to respond to changes within your account balance and provide the user with immediate rough feedback that gave them a clear message as to how much they had. This was sketched out and planned and I felt that a brand could be built around the idea of the PiggyBank.

The piggybank is a tradition visualisation of your money, and brings back memories of childhood and of saving up. I felt that it presented a strong graphic element that could be good at drawing attention to the service.

Also the way we interact with piggybanks gave nice opportunities for the physical aspect. Shaking and peer-ing through the small hole in the top to see how much we had were ways we as kids got rough information about how much we had, how much was inside. I thought these old traditional fun interactions could be used in some way, either to gain access to more detailed information or just as a way of getting rough feedback.

Make:

I started to create how the service would work by drawing a diagram based on how the service worked, and how each part of the service was aimed to give specifi c information.

Website/ Software: The software element of the PiggyBank service is aimed to give you the most information. This is very high level information that allows you to analyse and assess past and current situations, and allowing you to plan for the future. The software is downloaded from the web. Once downloaded you allow it access to your internet banking. It reads your statements and analyses each item by its code and also its reference and groups

similar information together. It also monitors the balance over dates creating calendar graphs showing the account balance over time. This allows visualise your spending patterns.

It also offers planning options. Wishlists can be produced within the software. It allows you to assign money against particular activities or purchases you wish to make that is separate from any account balance.

This coincides with setting “limits” By setting a limit you allow yourself a certain amount of money over an assigned period of time.

Another unique feature is that the software can manage a number of accounts. This means that all your fi nancial information is centralised. This should make fi nancial management easier.

Application:

The application provides a lite version of the software on the users phone. It allows you to check balances and limits whilst on the move. It shares the same graphic language as the webpage providing a seamless integra-tion of the service.

The limits that are set are recognised on the phone. Every time the amounts go down by £10 The phone vibrates and provides notifi cation of this.

The application is also used to provide the user remind-ers of standing orders and direct debits that are coming out, and also when overspending reminders based on items within their wishlists.

PiggyBank Object:

The PiggyBank object aims to provide that quick, rough tangible feedback. You can use it to get a really quick


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idea of the amounts you have, whether you should go out tonight, or can afford those new shoes.

The object sits within the home. When you want to check you money you pick it up and place it towards your ear and shake it. The noise made by the object is like coins rolling and rattling around inside. The amount of money you hear rattling is based on the amount in your account.

The way it works is within the object is a microchip with wifi . This chip is linked to your internet banking PiggyBank software. Every hour the chip is programmed to scan your software and take a live account balance. It then applies a sound based on the amounts within the account.

When you then pick it up and shake it the accelerometer recognises this motion and triggers the sound to play, giving you immediate tangible feedback on your account based on traditional interactions.

Evaluation/ Analysis.

Piggybank thus far, has been a project that has lead me to engage in a lot of discussion and debate around personal fi nance and spending.

It has been very interesting to hear peoples stories and personal experiences, and then to feed that into more contextual research to understand the bigger picture and build a story and an understanding of attitudes in Britain today.

I feel the PiggyBank system raises some interesting ideas. It is well thought out, and makes sense based on the research I conducted. The approach taken is creative and does provide some useful insights and ideas of what could be done to make personal fi nance more tangible. It allows a more tailored towards peoples actual needs and wants.

Summary/ Key points.

- PiggyBank aims to provide more tangible and understanable methods of budgetting.

-PiggyBank can link all of your accounts in one manageable software making budgeting more understandable.

- The service is spread over three levels expressing different levels of information.

- Each of these levels could be used in conjunction with one another, or could be applied as a singular service.

- The information is provided in a graphically engaging manner.

- PiggyBank allows the user to set long term fi nancial goals and actively encourages saving for them.

Going Forward.

- To build live fl ash prototypes so I can test the service on people and gain further insights.

- Opportunities to focus the project in a specifi c area, and include a local community or group.

- Consult a graphic designer on the information layout, and possible alternatives for visualisation.

- To explore the possibility of including businesses within a local area in the service. Users could monitor how well local independent stores are doing, and may support them.


Thanks. Joseph Smith. m. +44 (0) 7850 025 226 e. [email protected] w. joesphsmithdesign.carbonmade.com

Piggybank, personal banking

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