Impact Study on Financial Inclusion

The digital transformation of payment transactions offers opportunities for efficiency and social participation, but at the same time also carries the risk of increasing financial exclusion of certain population groups. While cash continues to play a central role in Austria, there has been an increasing shift towards digital payment systems in many areas of life. This development raises questions about equal access, competence requirements and the trustworthiness of digital financial systems.
Against this backdrop, the Austrian National Bank (OeNB) established the ‘Financial Inclusion’ working group of the ‘Forum on the Digital Euro’ in 2024 with the aim of creating framework conditions for the equitable participation of all population groups in the digital transformation of payment transactions. Building on a qualitative analysis of measures in EU countries with low cash usage and the identification of barriers for particularly vulnerable groups, the planned study aims to provide an empirically based quantification of the extent of financial exclusion in Austria.

In previous work packages, the OeNB working group has already identified those groups of people who are particularly at risk of financial exclusion, including people with disabilities, older people, people on low incomes or with limited access to digital devices, and people with a migrant background. The planned study will enable a nationwide quantitative survey of the extent of digital financial exclusion in Austria. The aim is to methodologically quantify the extent to which various groups at risk of exclusion are affected and to develop an index model that maps individual degrees of exposure across different payment scenarios (e-commerce, peer-to-peer, point-of-sale, payment acceptance). This will create the first empirical basis for determining the extent, structure and causes of digital financial exclusion in Austria and for developing evidence-based measures to promote financial inclusion.

You can take part in the survey here: https://tinyurl.com/oenbfragen