With the financial education app "Budget+plus", the Deutsche Stiftung Verbraucherschutz helps young people keep track of how they handle money. We support the foundation's work - with full conviction.
Uneconomical household management: when people under the age of 25 fall into over-indebtedness, this is usually the main trigger. That's borne out by figures from the Federal Statistical Office, published in 2019. "From the debt counselling offered by the consumer advice centres, we keep hearing that even very young people are sometimes heavily in debt and lack important knowledge and skills when it comes to handling money," observes Julia Marg, Managing Director of the Deutsche Stiftung Verbraucherschutz. Whether it's high bills for smartphone use or online shopping on credit: "The transition into adult life in particular is a time when big wishes often meet a modest income."
Promoting financial education
Strengthening financial literacy: this has been called for from many quarters and for a long time. "But at schools, teachers still often lack the materials and ideas to address such consumer-education topics in a way that relates to real life," Marg describes the starting point. The Deutsche Stiftung Verbraucherschutz is working to change that. Founded in 2010 by the Federation of German Consumer Organisations and its member organisations, the foundation focuses on the financial support of consumer-education projects.
That was also the aim of "Meine Finanzen, mein Leben im Griff" ("My Finances, My Life Under Control"), a funded project implemented by the consumer advice centres of North Rhine-Westphalia and Saarland. The goal of the project: a prototype of a digital household budget book that meets the needs of young people. The Deutsche Stiftung Verbraucherschutz had it developed into an app, which has been available to download free of charge for iOS and Android since 10 January. By early May, there had been more than 10,000 downloads.
A learning tool close to real life
Recording income and expenses, being reminded of regular payments, setting spending limits and savings goals: "Budget+plus" helps young people keep track of their own finances. No one needs to worry about data protection when using it. All data is stored only on the device. Above all, the app is intended to be a learning tool that lets you practise handling money in concrete terms. "With it, we're reaching out to families, but above all to multipliers such as educators. In addition, we provide accompanying materials for lessons and for use at home," says Marg.
The consumer advocate experienced first-hand just how well the app goes down with the target group when she recently presented it to a primary school class. Positive feedback like this encourages her and her team of three colleagues to keep driving the project forward. In particular, the integrated knowledge base, in which finance-related terms are explained, is set to grow further. Whether it's the pitfalls of various financing options or new payment methods such as PayPal, Klarna and the like: managing your own budget means something different today than it did just a few years ago.
A head start and support
The "Budget+plus" project is just a small snippet of the work done by the Deutsche Stiftung Verbraucherschutz. A new round of the "Consumer Schools" has just got under way as well. As part of this initiative, the Federation of German Consumer Organisations recognises schools that bring consumer education into the classroom through creative projects. This covers topics such as finances, media literacy or nutrition. Participating schools again receive a head start and support with learning content. For the coming year, a major project on the topic of "conscious and sustainable consumption" is also planned. For projects like these, the Deutsche Stiftung Verbraucherschutz collects donations.
On top of that, work on "Budget+plus" continues. For the development of its content, the consumer foundation has set up a dedicated panel of experts, which quirion is also a member of. "We support the consumer foundation's work with full conviction - financially and with our expertise," emphasises Martin Daut, CEO of quirion. Promoting financial literacy, he says, is after all a very important task for society. "Only those who have their finances under control create the freedom to set something aside. And to build wealth over the long term."
More information about "Budget+plus" can be found here.
