Botton Village is managed by the Camphill Village Trust, a national charity providing both supported living and day support opportunities to people with learning and other disabilities. Botton Village is rurally located on the North York Moors. The village has a number of residents living on site and provides day placements for those people choosing to live within their own homes but wish to access workshops and social farming opportunities on a daily basis. The nearest neighbouring villages of Castleton and Danby have a total population of around 2,000 people. Botton Village Community and the individuals it supports are dependent on cash, and as a forward-thinking provider of social care, Camphill Village Trust was keen to empower people to become more financially independent, improve self-responsibility, independence and budgeting skills which is far easier to achieve when people have access to their own cash.
A new Post Office to support basic banking transactions. In the village shop at Botton we put in a new service for the pilot period, which supported basic banking services such as cash withdrawal and cash and cheque deposits. Customers could also pay bills here, whether by cash or other means, and small businesses could order and collect floats. Customers could use this service regardless of who they banked with.
ATM. We have installed a free to use ATM in Botton Village to help people get access to their own money without having to pay.
Support to use banking services. Not everyone finds banking easy or straightforward. We offered practical support to help residents manage their money better and gain independence.
Guideto what banks can offer Banks offer a wide range of services that most people didn’t know about. As we set up these pilots, we had requests for a lot of services – and found that many were already offered. We wrote a short guide to these services, and how they can help consumers.