Covid-19 Debt Advice
Developing, evaluating, and deploying an online Covid-19 debt advice tool
Partners
Project Lead
Adam Wyner, Swansea UniversityCo-investigators
Richard Owen, Swansea UniversityProject Type
Funded ProjectAccording to Citizens Advice, the Covid-19 outbreak led to financial turmoil for millions of UK residents, undermining fairness, equality, and economic opportunity. Legal advice clinics desperately need greater capacity and the project aimed to support that by developing, evaluating, and deploying an online Covid-19 debt advice tool. The project formed their analysis in consultation with legal professionals and clients to co-create a support tool incorporating both perspectives and experiences. The aim of the tool was to gather essential, basic information about the client’s situation to enable debt advice by a legal professional.
The project came to appreciate a significant limitation introduced by data protection, liability, and legislation. Dispensing debt advice requires the collection and storage of complex, highly sensitive personal information. Addressing data protection issues was beyond the scope of the project’s resources. To shield participants from liability, a publicly accessible version was not released. Instead, the project developed a prototype accessed through the university server, which could be used to consult with user groups, carry out studies, and discuss with an advisory board. Although the potential social impact of such a tool is very apparent, the significant constraints would need to be addressed before progress could be made. It would be necessary to secure longer-term ‘buy in’ for tool development by legal professionals, clients, and others.
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