European Clearinghouse Financial Literacy
Wissensportal Finanzielle Allgemeinbildung

Product

The purpose of the Clearinghouse is to collect materials for promoting financial literacy among consumers. To do justice to this aim, clear rules must be established governing the contents of the materials presented through the Clearinghouse.

1. Applied education as opposed to abstract education

As financial literacy means individual competence in conducting financial transactions, the contents of the Clearinghouse should be confined to materials capable of improving the basis of consumers' financial decision-making.

The material should therefore relate to practical day-to-day decisions and be applicable to them. A single decision should therefore not be presented as the only right one; it should instead be made clear that the right decision depends on the personal life circumstances of the individual. To that end, alternatives and possible solutions should be highlighted without pre-empting the actual decision-making process.

General abstract financial and above all economic knowledge should not be disseminated through the Clearinghouse.

2. Education as opposed to marketing

The Clearinghouse is in principle open to materials from financial service providers. Mis-use of the Clearinghouse for targeted advertising of products by providers must, however, be avoided.

If a specific product is marketed, this in itself means that the real decision-making process has been pre-empted. For that reason alone, such materials should not be accepted by the Clearinghouse. Even promotion of a company's image packaged as pure information should not be included in the Clearinghouse. If financial service providers offer educational materials, their educational aspect must be clearly their main characteristic.

3. Observance of product criteria

To secure the consistent quality of its contents and to avoid making the Clearinghouse off-putting to people, we reserve the right to remove materials from the Clearinghouse which amount to marketing or which are otherwise unsuitable on the basis of the above criteria. In those circumstances, no claim may be brought against the providers of the Clearinghouse.

4. Observance of statutory conditions

If the operators of the Clearinghouse become aware that contents from a provider breach statutory prohibitions, common decency or the rights of Third Parties (trademarks and names, copyright and data protection legislation), display of these contents in the Clearinghouse will be terminated.