The IMF maintains that digitalization is the main tool for promoting social inclusion and driving economic development, diversity, and sustainability. Digitalization—like the other innovations from which we have benefited as a society throughout history—has allowed us to advance and improve our quality of life. We were able to confirm this during COVID when the internet was key to achieving a certain normality despite the illness.
Accessing and benefiting from digitalization is not a matter of age. In the banking sector, 55% of people over 65 prefer to communicate with their institution through digital channels. And 69% acknowledge that they had not visited a bank branch during the previous month, according to Metroscopia. Banks also guarantee in-person access, with priority, to people over 65 who do not want to or cannot use digital channels. They work to ensure that digitalisation does not exclude anyone. On the contrary, digital skills training programmes are being developed to facilitate access to digital environments, whether to book a medical appointment or access any product or service. And to communicate
The limits of digitalization focus on connectivity and digital skills, aspects that European authorities have committed to addressing. But they are not alone. For example, the banking sector employs significant resources in both financial education and improving the digital training of all types of groups. Each at their own pace, as in the case of older people, to ensure the achievement of the objective: to unite and not separate.
José Luis Martínez Campuzano, Spokesperson for the Spanish Banking Association
