Writing for consumer understanding
When the Financial Conduct Authority introduced its new Consumer Duty regulations, Barclaycard Payments needed to ensure every customer communication met a new, much higher bar. To support that shift, they brought in Deloitte Digital to build a specialist writing team.
My role
As the lead on a team of seven copywriters, I became immersed in all things Consumer Duty – helping revise existing comms so they met the new standard, and guiding team members through what good looked like.
I worked on:
Rewriting customer comms – Reviewing and improving existing content to focus on delivering the best outcomes for the customer
Creating a training course – Designing a course to help client teams understand the new regulations and what they meant in practice
Delivering the training – Running sessions on behalf of Deloitte Digital to show how the Duty should shape real-world comms
Writing a best practice guide – Producing a reference doc that broke down key rules and gave the client a practical framework to follow
Before-and-after examples – Demonstrating how language could shift from technically compliant to genuinely customer-friendly
The challenge
Consumer Duty marked a step change in how financial institutions need to talk to customers. It’s no longer just about being accurate - it’s about giving people the right information, at the right time, in a way they can genuinely understand, so they can make the best possible decisions.
Navigating those requirements without losing the Barclaycard voice took careful judgment - and a strong sense of where clarity ends and condescension begins.
The outcome
I helped Barclaycard Payments revise more than 500 customer communications to meet the new standard. Just like effective UX, the work meant considering the full customer journey – helping people navigate complex options and arrive at the outcomes that served them best.
It was especially rewarding to work with such a collaborative, skilled team – and to have the work recognised by Deloitte Digital as one of their most successful projects.