ACT Government — Family Safety Hub

Recognising and responding to financial abuse.

Service Design

We worked with the ACT Government’s Family Safety Hub to co-design a service to support frontline community workers to better recognise and respond to financial abuse, with a follow on embedded and collaborative service model, to tackle the ‘hidden problem and hidden solution’ nature of financial abuse.

What we made.

We formed a cross-functional team to define, prototype, and pilot a face-to-face financial counseling program.

  • Counseling service blueprint

  • Conversation guides

  • Hiring and training guides for required staff

  • 10 Wellbeing design principles

  • Development of (successful) Business case for test and learn launch

  • Design and build of digital tools to support conversation

The problem

90% of people who have experienced domestic and family violence have also suffered from financial abuse.

Despite being highly prevalent, awareness of both the problem and available support is low, it is both a hidden problem and hidden solution.

“Financial abuse is a hidden problem – with a hidden solution.”
—

The solution.

The intervention begins by raising awareness of the ‘hidden problem, hidden solution,’ by supporting frontline community service workers to better recognise and respond to financial abuse. Then, depending on the outcome of this first phase, an embedded and collaborative financial abuse service, to respond to a likely increase in demand for services. 

Our process included discovery, seeking out the most impactful space to focus on, an innovation challenge workshop to generate ideas, and design and prototyping to reveal the practical constraints for a feasible, but meaningful solution. It gave us the evidence to move forward to pilot with confidence.

The approach.

Our process moved from discovery research, to an innovation challenge workshop through to a co-design process, including prototyping and testing a service journey map.

More than 50 participants then attended the innovation challenge workshop, including people with lived experience of domestic and family violence.

In total participants came up with 76 solutions, to converge on 6 key concepts, of which 4 were prioritised to take forward. We then ran a design and prototyping and testing process which revealed the practical constraints for a feasible, but meaningful intervention.

The impact.

Restoring financial safety can give people the confidence to leave an abusive relationship. It also reduces the likelihood that they will be forced to return to an abusive relationship because of financial reasons. 

The financial implications of receiving the right advice, at the right time, can lead to life changing outcomes for people experiencing financial abuse, from avoiding bankruptcy to keeping their home. 

We have taken best practice from the field of domestic violence prevention, combined with local ACT perspectives, to adapt a service that lowers the barriers to seeking and accessing support for financial abuse.

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