Designing services for inclusion at scale with the ACT Government
→ Case Study
Commonwealth Bank
Redefining how banks support communities.
Social Impact
Digital Design, Apps
Benefits Finder directly connects everyday Australia to financial support through government benefits when they need it most.
CBA completely redefined the role banks play in supporting communities — genuinely helping people improve their financial wellbeing, by delivering $500+ million in benefits to over a million Australians in need.
Time
6 weeks
Prototypes
4 Iterations
Validated with
250+ live customers
The problem
Many people in Australia face extreme financial stress. ⅓ are unable to access $500 in emergencies.
The NSW Government provides over $115 billion of benefits annually, however billions are left unclaimed by those who need it most.
Social stigma, and high-effort processes mean people rarely know help is available, let alone access it — leading to hardship, and reduced quality of life.
The solution.
Unlike the Government, CBA has the real-time data to identify who’s eligible for rebates — along with an app used by 6.1 million people.
Over 6 weeks we designed and piloted a service to proactively connect people to rebates they’re eligible for — making it simpler to apply.
“I’m shocked. This is a good idea, and funnily enough is far clearer than browsing the government page. Nice to see your bank doing something somewhat slightly useful for working class people.”— Benefits Finder Customer
The approach.
Creating a digital prototype would’ve focused on the technology not on the people. So we chose to validate our riskiest assumptions by delivering the same service manually through a call centre — collaborating with data-science teams to identify eligible customers, and manually reaching out to them over the phone.
This innovative approach allowed us to quickly and cost-effectively understand the human needs, and validate the concept before expensive technology investment — generating the evidence and human stories for funding.
“This call came at the perfect time — I’d literally just got my disconnection warning. Thanks to this, we can keep the power on”— Benefits Finder Customer
The impact.
Benefits Finder redefined the role banks can play in society — from simply providing financial services, to genuinely helping people and communities prosper.
Traditional thinking was that investing in services that support customers in need would only ever cater to the least profitable customers, and could never shift the bottom line.
By providing support in an ‘un-bank-like’ manner, CBA has been able to shift its role from ‘just another big 4 bank’ to a genuine pillar of support in the community.
“Since the start of the pandemic, we have provided support to approximately 100,000 businesses and one million personal customers.”— Matt Comyn, CEO, Commonwealth Bank
