The Connexions Card was a smart card for 16- to 19-year-olds in England for rewarding students who turned up to lessons, work-based training and other activities with points that could be redeemed for discounts on consumer goods listed on the Connexions website, [1] bus journeys [2] or suitable goods in local retailers. [3]
The seven-year contract to run the Connexions Card was won by Capita, [4] signed in July 2001, [5] and operated as a Public-Private Partnership with a budget of £109million. [6]
The scheme flopped [7] and was sunsetted in the summer of 2006 [8] with a saving of £23million. [9] Over the course of its operation, from its roll-out in early 2002 to its conclusion, one million cards had been issued [10] but only 145,947 had ever been used. [11] (183 million [11] out of 1.6 billion points [12] had been redeemed.)
An official evaluation of the programme completed in September 2004 [13] concluded that the programme had fallen far short of its aims (e.g. 1.7 million young people using the card in a steady state) and there was no clear evidence of a direct impact on attitudes to attendance, learning or career choices. Indeed, the only young people to use the cards were those who didn't have a problem in the first place. [13] The inflexible contract with Capita was also singled out as a barrier to targeting the product more effectively. And, as predicted, [14] the system where students had to swipe their cards through a reader connected to Capita's central database at the beginning of every lesson (in addition to the school keeping its own attendance register) was a disaster. [13]