How do we support our vulnerable customers at Cuvva?

(This article contains references to domestic violence.)

Here at Cuvva we always want to do the right thing by our customers. We’re also committed to treating our customers fairly and breaking down the walls of financial exclusion.

Keeping all that in mind, we understand that some customers may be vulnerable. By that, we mean that the customer is more susceptible to harm when they engage with a financial services provider. This could include financial harm, such as financial losses, and emotional harm, like inconvenience and stress.

This could be due to a number of reasons, including (but not limited to):

• A mental or physical health condition
• Life events such as the death of a loved one or domestic violence
• Issues with financial resilience such as debt or financial difficulties
• Communication issues, such as a customer struggling to speak to us as they struggle with English

We also understand that customers can sometimes have overlapping vulnerabilities. For instance, a customer that has a mental health condition might be particularly vulnerable if they have suffered a recent bereavement.

We know that customers may not be vulnerable forever, and that our customers' circumstances can change.

However, our staff are trained to spot the signs of vulnerability. For instance, our staff will know to offer support when a customer's language or circumstances suggest vulnerability. This could include changing our communication method or approach, or pointing the customer in the direction of organisations that can help, such as Mind.

And where we think that a customer might be vulnerable, where appropriate, we’ll also ask sensitive and non-intrusive questions to see what we can do to make their customer journey easier. For example, if it becomes clear that a customer is struggling to understand our products because they have a learning difficulty, then we will tailor our communication approach to ensure we’re explaining our products in a way that they can understand.

Or if, for instance, a customer develops a sight issue and struggles to read our in-app messages, then we would help the customer to update the settings on their phone to make the font larger in the first instance. We’ll always be respectful, kind and non-judgemental.

We’re always happy for customers to proactively contact us to ask us for extra assistance. We’ll treat the information they share with us in confidence.

We’re happy to make reasonable adjustments where necessary to assist customers with using our service.

We also regularly seek feedback from our customers, and we’ll continue to strive to offer the best possible service for our customers.