Inclusive by design

How we’re creating good tech to solve a meaningful problem

Earlier this year I started a new job. I am now the lead design engineer at a lovely company called Vouchsafe. We are a tech-for-good startup that’s helping people without a photo ID access essential services.

When you hear the words “tech” and “ID” together, you may start thinking that we’re building an app. Maybe something like BritCard, the latest brain child of the thinktank Labour Together.

Concept screenshots of the BritCard app. Source

This is a mandatory digital ID that would be provided free of charge to all British residents. It would allow anyone with the right to live and work in the UK to prove their identity. This app, they claim, could end identity exclusion.

But we’ve seen what happens when you go straight to solutions; you end up excluding people you’re trying to help. Every time. What’s meant to be a silver bullet becomes another standard for the pile of standards.

What BritCard misses is the conversation about the problem; ID poverty.

What is ID poverty?

In short, it’s the inability to prove who you are. When someone can’t do this it leaves them locked out of services they should be able to have access to. This could be something trivial, like buying alcohol from a supermarket…