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Both offer a quick summary of key facts, but only one understands the importance of a consistent format.
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Both offer a quick summary of key facts, but only one understands the importance of a consistent format.
US, UK and EU regulations all require credit card companies to provide a summary of key facts about interest rates and fees, in a standardised box you see when you apply. In the UK it’s called the Summary Box, while in the US it is known as the Schumer Box (after Chuck Schumer, the senator who instigated it).
The problem is that they all look different, so it’s not very easy to compare them. Your eye can’t go to the same place in each competitor’s box to compare interest rates. The visual format, and even the title, is not specified in the UK regulations.1
The US Nutrition Facts, on the other hand, is standard across all food products.2 This means you can quickly find and compare different brands and different foods.
Why do I think this is worth including here? Two things...
Information is only informative if it’s clear. This is as important as getting the content right. Nutrition Facts is a rare example of well-designed regulatory information. The summary boxes are supposed to be helpful – that’s what information designers do, so please talk to us, regulators and banks.
Information that appears across competing products is an example of intertextuality. This is a linguistic term describing ‘the mutual relevance of separate texts’.3 This means that when you write and design information, people will see it alongside other documents they are comparing with. So you are to some extent constrained by what the other documents do.
1. https://www.lendingstandardsboard.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Cardholder-Statement-Summary-Box1.pdf
2. https://www.fda.gov/food/nutrition-food-labeling-and-critical-foods/changes-nutrition-facts-label
3. De Beaugrande R, Dressler W (1981) Introduction to Text Linguistics. Longman, London, page 37.