post by Ellie Colegate (2021 cohort)
For the last few months, I’ve spent time doing something most people avoid at all costs: reading and understanding credit agreements. No, my PhD didn’t suddenly take a turn from investigating social media platforms to deciphering fixed and promotional annual percentage rates. I commenced my placement with the University of Nottingham Law School, working on a new research project.
This project sees researchers from the school collaborate with Amplifi to improve the readability of financial documents, making them more accessible for a wide range of people with varying levels of financial literacy. I was brought into this project to help out where I can, using my knowledge of where legal terms could be translated or simplified without losing meaning, and to act as a first reader of some of the documents and prototypes to analyse these critically.
The placement was exciting, and the work was a nice change of pace from the last few (can be frantic) months of my PhD. As someone who typically skimmed these documents and assumed I understood what I was reading, it was really good to get into the details to know where mismatches between what the document says and what people might realise could be addressed and improved. By doing this work, I’ve seen not only the future real-world impact but also the urgent need for it, as people are now offered digital banking by default, losing the high street bank spaces where they might usually seek support. It is essential that when individuals, who may feel isolated, agree to these terms, they fully understand what they are entering into and the consequences of doing so.
My Role: Informed Reader, Confused Customer
Coming into this placement, I knew my legal knowledge might be of use; I have experience understanding contracts, I’ve taught it before, and have spent most of my PhD and research career so far reading complex documents and understanding how obligations and rights work together. Financial documents, I assumed, would be contracts with some financial terms thrown in. I was both right and completely wrong.
When I first met with the partner organisation to figure out what my role would be in the team, we established that, whilst I had a background in law and was able to understand the legal foundations of agreements, my lack of experience with financial agreements as a regular person was a real asset to the team. They didn’t need another financial expert, they had the source documents and other people for that. What they needed was someone who could spot when legal language was perhaps too complicated while also encountering these financial concepts for the first time. I was also coming into the project at a point where these documents had been in development with the same team for a while, so a fresh perspective and pair of eyes was welcomed! So my role became a kind of professional code-switcher: one moment I’d be flagging a clause that was needed for a person to understand what they were agreeing to, but that could perhaps be written differently. But I’d also be marking sections with honest confusion – I recall a particular back and forth with a type of interest rate where I ended up commenting something like “I’ve read this four times and still don’t understand it, I think this is just a confusing thing!” This combination proved surprisingly useful for the team and powerful for moving the documents forward toward deployment with participants. I was able to identify where complexity served a legal purpose versus when it was just complex for the sake of being complex and could be changed to be more accessible.
Interest Rates Rising, So Too Are the Complexities of Documents
With more and more high street banks closing each month, a physical place where customers can go to seek support and explanations of what are serious and legally binding documents is slowly disappearing. Therefore, there must be alternative ways in which users can understand the documents they sign and seek support if they need it. The work I have done on this project has reassured me that this type of work is taking place, with researchers from the School and Ampfli working together to understand where complexities exist in these documents, actively engaging with everyday people to improve their wording and make these often complex financial concepts and documents accessible to as many people as possible.
During my time, I went from being overwhelmed about APR’s, fixed-term rates, and all the small print you say you’ve read, but you’ve probably just skimmed the headings off because we all like to think the worst will never happen, to someone who now can enter into an agreement for say a credit card, much more informed and can confidently say I understand how the APR will be calculated on my purchases. This really highlighted to me, as someone who has a background in understanding the legal formation of contracts in quite some depth, the mismatch between how information that financial institutions provide is framed and the information that people understand when reading the documents.
At this time, when everyone is watching their finances, having clear and easy-to-understand documents for things like credit agreements will be incredibly beneficial to ensure people are fully aware of any financial agreements they enter into and the consequences of these.
Working on this project gave me a nice change of pace and direction to the work I have been conducting in my PhD research. Whilst both projects revolved around the end result of end users – my PhD focusing on young people and their experiences of harm on social media and this project focusing on how complex the general population can understand financial concepts and information – they differed in their specific focus which gave me an opportunity vary my working focus whilst continuing to develop my skills.
I was able to bring my pre-existing knowledge of legal contracts and their formation, characteristics, potential conflicts and resolution to a new area that I have not previously looked at in depth. This was a real asset to the project and the work I was doing, as whilst I understood the basics of how the agreements I was reading would legally operate, I was exactly the same as the participants we were going to be recruiting so I could provide valuable feedback on the layout and wording of documents and wireframes and make suggestions for the team. Whenever I faced unfamiliar concepts or tasks, Sarah from Amplifi was available to discuss them with me and review my comments as needed. This support truly made me feel like part of the team, working together in real time to prepare the project for recruiting participants. Working with Amplifi and the School showed me how industry collaboration can differ from academic work – the feedback cycles were faster with immediate practical applications, whereas in academia, writing for research and working on outputs can be a longer, more protracted process.
Through reviewing documents, analysing terminology, and assessing draft intelligibility, I developed my attention to detail and critical analysis of written documents for intelligibility. This is a practice that has hugely helped in my thesis writing, as I am now ableo see where the language is perhaps too complex without a need to be so and adapt this to be more accessible for readers.
Conclusion
By the end of the placement working on this project, I had developed an understanding of APR that I never expected I would have gained. I also saw the real-world importance of having financial documents that are understandable for all.
I went in thinking that finance and financial terminology are just difficult and complex, and it’s likely always to be that way. But working on this project with the team at the School and at Amplifi, I have seen how the contents in these documents and agreements can be broken down and presented in a way that is easy to understand for all.
I’ve been inspired to look at the language used in the documents and legislation I am reviewing as part of my PhD project to see if there are any, perhaps, overcomplexities and how these might impact the end results for users.
I’ve also become much more knowledgeable about credit card agreements, now hearing radio adverts that quickly rush through the small print about “APR rates,” knowing with confidence that I could probably work it out on a purchase if needed. It’s probably a niche skill, but I’m sure it will come in handy one day!