Mention of our research in a podcast by The Banker on basic banking services
Our collaboration partner Andra Sonea (University of Warwick, UK) was recently interviewed by The Banker, a Financial Times publication on finance and banking. She reported on the so-called basic banking services and how these are provided in the UK by the Post Office, a privatised, state-owned company. With the vast majority of Post Office branches operated as franchises, there is a major risk that basic access to banking services and cash will no longer be guaranteed, particularly for economically vulnerable citizens and small businesses in structurally deprived areas, if some of the larger operators go out of business due to bankruptcy or other reasons. As part of her interview, Andra also elaborated on our joint research on geographic and temporal access to basic banking services in Wales, which we published in Applied Spatial Analysis and Policy in 2021. In the paper, we find that despite government pronouncements to the contrary, the portion of the population that the government suggests should have access to basic banking services actually does not – a pattern that is also geographically dispersed and results in spatial inequity.
Listen to the full podcast: https://shows.acast.com/e7e47475-e682-4440-a586-a5472f726210/episodes/65cb461753ad510017e82fac?
Read our covered paper: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12061-021-09386-3