A Partnership to accelerate the development of digital services available using the Young Scot National Entitlement Card (NEC) has been agreed between Young Scot and the Improvement Service.
Young Scot and the Improvement Service will work with a range of partners, including NECPO and Transport Scotland, using mobile and digital technology to create a step change in the delivery of information and services to the 680,000 Young Scot NEC holders.
The benefits to young people are expected to include:
- Ability to receive universal, targeted and bespoke entitlements, concessions, discounts and rewards
- A digital version of the Young Scot NEC
- Proof of age and entitlement using a mobile device
- Barriers to employment, training and well-being being addressed
The Partnership’s focus will also look at bringing together the Young Scot NEC and myaccount, helping young people access securely a wider range of personalised services and information, both locally and nationally.
Using the smart infrastructure behind the Young Scot NEC, and adding innovation into the mix, the Partnership is designed to underpin other wider ambitions. These include Scottish Government’s aims of tackling inequalities and of reducing poverty across Scotland, Scotland’s Digital Future Strategy and Transport Scotland’s Smart and Integrated Ticketing Strategy.
As it takes developments forward, the Partnership will draw upon input and expertise from representatives across the National Entitlement Card Programme Office (Dundee City Council), Transport Scotland, Local Authorities and others.
Young people will be fully involved in the co-design of services, a focus of which will be on delivering a good user-experience.
The Partnership will be speaking to organisations over the coming months as the new services are developed and tested.
Services developed and approaches used as part of the Partnership will be examined to explore how they might be re-used to deliver smart, digital services for other groups of people, such as older volunteers and the unemployed.
Louise Macdonald, Chief Executive of Young Scot, said, “The Young Scot National Entitlement Card is an exciting platform for service innovation.
Two out of every three young people have a Young Scot NEC, this gives us scale to try new solutions and use technology to tackle inequality in all of its forms.”
Colin Mair, Chief Executive of the Improvement Service, added, “An important dimension to our exciting Partnership with Young Scot is not only on how we can make life easier for young people, but equally on how we can support changing peoples’ lives for the better while innovating along the way.”