Notes from User meeting -- Tulsa OK 17OCT2014

[jdungan]

LOCATION:
South Tulsa Community House (https://www.facebook.com/SouthTulsaCommunityHouse)

DISCUSSIONS: Explained the balance app to a community house user. He did not want to use it because he was worried about where his account number might be stored.

Met with four women attending a daily GED class. All four had SNAP accounts.

I explained how the service works and asked everyone to send their account numbers to the stage number. Results:

• One didn't participate because the she didn't want to send her account over the phone
• Two didn't have cards
• One had a card and was successful (whew!)

All thought the service would be used by people because it was easier than dialing the numbers.

We discussed other services or ideas. All also used Temporary Aid for Needy Families (pronounced Taniff). This is a debit card for non-food needs. It is refreshed every month BUT their account is charged $0.50 for every call to check the balance. All used a web site to look up balances.

We discussed the possibility of saving account numbers with phone numbers and receiving updates. They explained that everyone's account is updated on either the 1st, 5th, or 10th each month. (This is done to keep everyone from going to the stores on the same day). They also explained that 'everyone' checks their balances at midnight on these dates to make sure that transfers were made. Being able to have an automatic confirmation would be very helpful.

COMMENTS

• Every had a smart phone
• One user shared her phone with her grandmother (who also has a SNAP account). Need to keep in mind that registering one phone number to one account might not work for everyone

ACTION ITEMS: -Provide cards with number once the production number is live

[daguar]

This is super helpful feedback, thanks!

[lippytak]

Interesting about the TANF card - I had no idea there was another debut system for that. We've also heard other requests for something closer to 'deposit alerts' so that's good to validate.

@jdungan thanks so much for doing this and writing it up. Very cool to see user research notes on GH!