Off Air... with Jane and Fi - Caught in Take That traffic

Episode Date: June 29, 2026

Jane's made it to Bordeaux without melting, and it's Fi and Eve with you for the week. They cover Duncan Ferguson lying across Hilary Mantel, dogs flying out of planes, the joy of teachers, and comfortable flatforms. Plus, we look at AI in banking. Harriet Rees, Group Chief Information Officer at Starling, and Lawrence White, UK Banking Correspondent at Reuters, join Fi. You can buy tickets for Fringe by the Sea: https://www.fringebythesea.com/off-air-with-jane-fi-and-special-guest-jan-ravens/ Our next book club pick will be a collection of short stories! 'Interpreter of Maladies' is by Jhumpa Lahiri.  You can check out our YouTube channel here: https://www.youtube.com/@OffAirWithJaneAndFOur new playlist 'Coiled Spring' is up and running: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/4tmoCpbp42ae7R1UY8ofzaOur most asked about book is called 'The Later Years' by Peter Thornton.If you want to contact the show to ask a question and get involved in the conversation then please email us: [e-mail] us on Instagram! @janeandfiPodcast Producer: Eve SalusburyExecutive Producer: Rosie Cutler Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

So you were saying you don't like wearing a trainer with a skirt. So Fee's wearing some absolutely beautiful or what do you call them a flat form? Sandal. They are. They call that. I was just going to say

they're just like a great big wedge. Yeah. An enormous cork wedge. They are really, really beautiful. And I asked Fee if she's ever feels like she's going to roll her ankle. That you're... No, they're quite nice and solid.

Sometimes if I'm wearing... wearing an espadryl, which has got a heightened wedge. But this is basically just kind of elevating me off the ground all at once. Might I say it's also elevating your outfit? Well, darling, that's very kind of you. But you were saying that you can't wear trainers with a skirt. I'm just not into it as much. And I'm wearing a lot of like kind of longer skirts at the moment because of the heat.

And it just doesn't really feel right then to stick a pair of trainers on the end of that. No, I'm with you. I'm with you. I'm on the lookout for some more. comfortable but slightly smarter or prettier shoes than just a trainer. I think it's very complicated, what to wear, especially to the office. And actually, we've got some fantastic emails about this. Oh, yeah. I was going to send them your way.

Because we're just very unused to hot, hot, hot summers. And I think actually we're quite unused to making that distinction between hot outside and air conditioning inside. Other countries have just gotten an awful lot better at it. I think the footwear is incredibly troublesome. I just have an absolute ick about men's feet. Full stop. It doesn't matter if they've been pedicured. It doesn't matter if they've been buffed.

I don't. I do not want to see my male colleagues' toes on display in the office eve. And I'm ashamed of my prejudice. You know, all those people who, you know, write comments under Times articles, they will come for me with my terrible hypocrisy. But this is one you're standing by. I'm going to stand by it. I don't mind women's feet.

And actually, I don't really mind an unruly female foot, but an unruly male foot will make me feel queasy for a long time after I've witnessed it. It does feel a bit odd in an office setting. Is this a beach in Australia? Yeah. It's just, I don't know. I just, it really, it just curdles my mind.

But then I also have a thing more generally because a couple of years ago the flip-flop really had a big resurgence and it kind of became with the haveyors yes haveioners model off duty what did you say model off duty model off duty you know where they're just papped around and they look very casual oh is that a term yeah they're in their flip flops and jeans it's like model off duty look I love this love this right I have a bit of a thing about people wearing flip flops around London I just think the ground is so dirty yeah you're on the tube and stuff and you get home and the edges of your feet are black because the flipflop is not providing enough protection. I'm with you girlfriend. I'm with you and I see people attempting a line bike

with a flip flop. I just think that's dangerous. Something's going to get caught. It's going to fall off. You're just not going to be able to apply the right amount of purchase to your pedal. So, yep, I am with you. Shall we do some, and we haven't got to, we haven't got to any solutions in Let me just ask you one final thing. I just spoke around in circles. Would you favour the very, very ugly sandal that seems to have come into fashion over the last? Well, I mean, they look a little, you know, squint a bit

and it's like an orthopedic boot, isn't it? Yes. So they've got a massively thick soul that's kind of bigger than your foot and then great big straps across it. And a lot of people are wearing that, and I don't understand it. It doesn't seem to be aesthetically appealing at all leave.

No, I don't understand it either, but I do find myself looking at them longingly because they look so comfortable. It's kind of like a mattress for your foot, but I don't think I would personally ever don't one. No, good. Would you? No, I wouldn't.

And you and I... Oh, no, you're in a cork platform. Yeah, we can carry on working together, save for the knowledge that neither of us are going to be incredibly disturbed by other people choose. Oh, I've left the one that I wanted you to read out on my desk. I want you to go and get it. Yes, I've done the wrong piles.

We were distracted, weren't we? Because of the very sad death of Penelope Keith. So we were going to run. Should I talk amongst myself? So we were very sad. We were very sad because all of these greats of comedy have reached, you know, their 80s and 90s. Patricia Routledge died, didn't she, I think, only a couple of months ago.

And Penelope Keith, I think, to the man are born, in particular, for those of us of a certain age, it just was funny. I think if we watched it now, it would be very odd. The thing that I really remember was the set was incredibly obviously a set. So they would always have a picture of the car

coming up, the drive to the Great Big Country House, but then it was very clear that it wasn't filmed in a Great Big Country House. It really was the wobbly kind of acorn antiques set, design. So we were talking about that and I got distracted and I put my things in the wrong pile. Here we go. Hot weather dress. Could you read that out, please? I try not to pant. Well, I think some people would like itty. Sprinted down the office. Pant away. This comes from Susie in North Yorkshire. Hearing you speak about dress codes,

i.e. skirts, not trousers for girls. It reminded me of a time in 1976 when I worked on a post office counter. Very hot, as you remember. I wore some addresses. Fine. so far, but some were holterneck and low-backed, which caused a problem. The boss asked me to pop into his office and told me I couldn't wear the low-backed dress as it showed I wasn't wearing a bra. I'd had a major operation leaving me with a nasty scar just under my bust. Did I grab that excuse and run with it? No.

The spiky young, 23-year-old woman I was, I pointed out that my 38 AA boobs were a lot smaller than all of the male clerks. Get them to wear a bra and I will. End of chat. Still spike at 73. Love Susie. Absolutely brilliant response. Absolutely brilliant response. Because sometimes, you know, the mobs on display at the moment are quite terrifying.

This comes in from Judith in the Lakes, just listening to Thursday's pod and the subject of trousers in the workplace. I started working in 1980 at a building society where females in trousers were absolutely not approved of. Being slightly rebellious and physically awkward, I hated wearing skirts. So one day, I wore trousers. Within an hour, I was hauled into a side office told that my trousers were not suitable attire. I would have been sent home to change, but I lived 10 miles away, so told that I could continue the day

but to wear something more suitable in future. I was mortified, but also internally raging. I later learnt that the CEO was a legs man. Oh, I know. Sicky emoji. And that's why it was a skirt's preferred environment. Thankfully, I outstayed the sexist CEO and ended my career there 30 years later at executive level,

having overseen the introduction of a uniform which included trousers. Little Wins can have big impact. Well, well done, you, Judith. And isn't that just so funny, that phrase, legs man, because for a long time, you could be defined as either a legsman or a breast man. And probably the term wasn't breast, it was something else. But I've yet to hear in my 57 and a half years on the planet, a woman ever say to another woman, you know, are you a bicep girl or are you a butt girl?

You know, we just haven't defined the male body in the same way, haven't me? And the idea that you're a legs man and therefore you want to see a lot of your employees' legs on a space, just to keep you feeling happy throughout the day. There's another pair of legs. And I dread to think how it even came to like that he was a leg's man. Why is that common knowledge in a professional setting? Yes, it's just revolting, isn't it? So Judith, well done.

You say it's a little win, but I think it's quite a big win, actually. We've got a rebellious listenership. We've got a lovely rebellious listenership. And Claire from Hertfordshire has sent us a photograph of Harry Style, sporting a very naty pair of shorts. As part of a suit, Claire went to see Harry Styles at Wembley last week, and they are very, very short shorts. and it's a bright blue suit

and he's wearing the pop socks and the brogs and bearing in mind it was 37 or 38 degrees in London last week I mean I don't know how Harry managed to do it and I don't know how the crowd managed to do it I think there were quite a lot of pass things out yeah and there was I think there was a video of Harry Stiles himself

he's like sweet some water and then sort of started to cough and choke on it a bit and had to lie down on the stage yeah I think it was a lot for everyone but huge huge heat to contend with. Take that we're playing as well in Stratford in the London Stadium, the West Ham Stadium, which West Ham got because it was a premiership stadium, and I just point out, absolutely no relish at all, absolutely no relish at all, that they're not in the premiership anymore, so what happens?

Take that performance in their stadiums. We got caught in some Take That Traffic. I was quite jealous of the people who wanted to take that. Oh my God. So I was just trying to get back from the end of school. Actually, I just want to say a tiny thing about that in a moment. Back to my home in East London and we got caught in the Take That Traffic. What is Take That Traffic?

Take That traffic is a fantastic dad or husband driving 14 women in a minibus to take that. that. So we got to the edge of Olympic Park. And it was obvious it was going to take people about 40 minutes to get in the traffic. It was just completely static. And car after car after car opened with beautiful women and actually loads of 40-something, 50-something women with their daughters as well, which is absolutely lovely to see all the cars being driven by the husband or the dad. Nobody got angry. Nobody got annoyed. It was quite wonderful. So, I mean, all hail to the boys. I think they're better off with that, Robbie. They take that documentary, I can highly, highly recommend, even if you aren't particularly

interested in take that. Or you think that all of those documentaries are hagiographies, because they are all except produced by the people who are featured in them. But it's actually really brilliant. And Gary Barlow talks about himself in an incredibly honest and, you know, quite difficult way about all of the problems that he had with his managing. his ego, managing his depression, managing his eating. I mean, he's really bold actually about laying it all down on the table. I thought it was a cracking, cracking watch. Just give it a watch. Yeah. I reminded myself something I wanted to say, and I've forgotten it now, Eve. School? School. My daughter has left school, so that is the last in our

household to be in school. And I just wanted to say such a massive, massive thank you. my two have met along the way teachers who undoubtedly their lives are better through having known them they've just been so full of beans energy insightful tuition they've made school fun i mean honestly i was standing on the playing field uh looking around at all of the the young ones going to their prom they just look so beautiful these days so so so beautiful and all of the teachers who were there too. And you know, sometimes in love, you do just have that slight overwhelm of emotion, and I'm not expressing it very well now, but I just wanted to say such a huge, huge thank you. And KSE, who does sometimes listen to this podcast,

can you see what they've done there with her initials? Thank you. God, oh, thank you. Took a while, didn't it's Monday? Come on, come on, Eve. It is a Monday. Yeah. in this. I think you're just one of the most remarkable

educationalists in the business. So I'd like to thank you for being part of my kids' lives. And that ends the adulation of teachers' section. But they do make such a huge difference. They're going, God, the energy. I mean, how you managed to keep that going for years and years and years in the classroom?

I just don't know. And the knock that teachers sometimes get for the long holidays and decent. and pensions, God, they deserve absolutely every single second of relaxation outside of the classroom. And their retirement should be incredibly well padded. Sorry, my headflames. You're actually dodgy. As a student, I think when you get to that end point where you're saying goodbye to your school and all the build-up of the exams and stuff, it all kind of falls away. And you do just have this unbelievable relief and gratitude left for the teachers who sometimes

managed to drag you there kicking and screaming to the end. And you are only, I was trying to work this out, coming into work this morning, you are only, what, eight or nine years out of school, correct? How old are you? Yes, I'm 27. Yes. Yeah.

So it's good that you can recognise that already. Yeah, well, I think... Sorry, that sounds an incredible... No, no, I think that's perfectly... I think that's quite right, but I think because it maybe really was touch and go there a little bit of my phone. And I just remember my... teacher like really looking in the eye and being like just get on with it and then me being like

and then at the end just being like thank you so much that's well good on you for being able to recognise that actually and for responding to the maybe you want to put your finger out now soles free do you go back to your school do your school know how much you've achieved um thank you don't quite know I'd answer that um I have been in touch with my school actually previously because I have booked them as a teacher's voice for news shows that I've worked on. Okay.

So I've been in touch with them so they know that I work here. But not loads and loads. And would you be one of those students happy to go back and talk to other kids? Yes, definitely. I actually had a very positive school experience. But I think something that's amazing about teachers, you have only so many teachers in your life

so you remember them really, really pointily. And I'm sure teachers remember so many of their students. But I just find it amazing that they do what they did for me round and round around for so many students every single year. Yep. And I completely agree with you on that. And then that's exactly what I was thinking, looking around the playing fields, that there's so much energy that's come from all of the teaching stuff

in my kids' lives for the last 15 years or so. And yet these teachers will literally pack. it up for the summer, come back in and do it all again for another cohort. And I just think it's remarkable, absolutely remarkable. And especially these days, because you are also tasked with this massive emotional responsibility for your pupils for informing them about the geopolitics of the world, absolutely everything from, you know, keeping yourself alive with first aid to spotting the early signs of sexually transmitted diseases. Everything seems to be lumped at a teacher's door. And the fact that you're also managing to

send out into the world people who know something about physics or geography or chemistry or whatever it is just seems absolutely remarkable too. So we love the teachers, don't we? Not all of them though, because I had some right old shits. As did I. So we won't

name them, but the ones that we love, we absolutely love them. I should also just say a quick hello to Mr Ling. Less of a teacher, more of a way of life. Paddington Bear Stairs and Tupperware trials. This is incoming from Katrina. Now, Katrina, I'm a little bit worried about your household.

Here we go. I had musings on a couple of Wednesday's meteor topics, but while sweltering all night in a suboptimal south-facing London extension. You kind of regret that, aren't you? I've tackled nothing more demanding than the Paddington Bear Stair. Our Cat Biscuit reserves these icy,

withering reproaches for occasions when the human race is particularly disappointing. him, such as last week, when not only had my early teenage boys foiled his attempt to sneak a dead Robin upstairs, that's very sad, the robins are beautiful, and slung him out in the garden, but I was apparently inexcusably slow and realizing that he wanted to come in again five minutes later. We've been trying to foster the boy's mastery of life skills, particularly in the housework, hygiene and cooking arenas, having identified that these were not their natural strengths. So I was pleased that they dealt with the Robin situation themselves. It was a couple of days

before I discovered that the boys had gone slightly rogue in their animal undertaker services, and rather than benefiting from a simple eco-barial in a flower bed, the robin had been neatly sealed in a plastic takeaway container and placed in the sunniest corner of the patio, where it had been stewing away ever since. A gentle inquiry revealed that there had been a thought process behind this that wanted the robin to rest in peace, undisturbed by biscuit or any other cat. Do you like that?

We discussed the natural cycle of life, and I left them to it again. Yesterday the elders mentioned that the burial had been adjusted to an eco one they'd lobbed the robin over the neighbour's fence. Oh, good trip. Once I'd done due diligence and confirmed that Robin's final destination had been the overgrown, currently uninhabited garden on one side of us rather than the neat lawn and large ornamental pond on the other and that they'd even remember to take it out of the box first.

I relaxed. It wasn't until the evening that I remembered to check whether they'd put that container in with the plastic recycling. Oh no, replied the youngest proudly. broken so I rinsed it and put it back in the kitchen cupboard. Right. The tension is very much there. It is, yes, and I admire your honesty as well. And I mean, it's a difficult thing, isn't it?

If we keep cats, they are definitely killers in the local natural environment. And there is a conflict there, isn't that? Definitely, definitely a conflict. Melanie, who is one of our regular correspondence from Chichester, sometimes to be found in a shadow, Eve. she is a bit fed up with football being on all the time and there is something about this World Cup

because it goes on for a very long time it's in so many different destinations even though it is very very far away and a lot of it is happening at night while we're asleep it does feel a bit more overwhelming than others would you agree? What? Because it's in so many places

because you wake up in the morning there's just a lot just a lot to get your head round and I mean I'm saying sounding like a commander of the British Empire here that everything should be in our time zone. Named and pale pink. And I think because of that as well, I'm not really following the schedule quite

so closely, so then you don't really know when you're going to be caught unaware because there is a football game going on shortly and you weren't really, you didn't know. Yeah, totally. You're sat in a natural wine bar and there's loads of men in football shirts around you because they're going on to a game. That's what I found myself in Brighton's.

Are they not watching it in the natural wine bar? Are they not watching it with a bit of skin contact orange wine. A screen. Thankfully. Do you know what? When the World Cup makes it to the organic wine bars

of Hove, Brighton and Worthens, we know that it's a spent force and we all need to try and find another sport to watch, I think. Or I don't know. Maybe that's... A lot of people say that's what's happened to Arsenal anyway, isn't it?

Yes. The Tapas Club of North London. I'm not complaining. So, Melanie, I'm sorry. There are quite a few people who feel the same way as you and you know you just got to hang on in there find some other things on Netflix

and try and distract yourself and Wimbledon comes along if you like the tennis then that's great if you don't like the tennis you really are absolutely stuffed for the next couple of weeks maybe try to take that documentary yes one very good idea now why I've scrawled

in a great big highlighter pen across Kath's email because Jane was saying that she wanted to know whether anybody else had indulged in Big Dunk, which is the autobiography of Duncan Ferguson that she's very, very much enjoyed. And I think it's been in, you know, the kind of top 40 books for about the last 265 years. And Kath comes in and says, I thought you might enjoy this section of our mad bookcase where Big Dunk is lying casually on top of Hillary Mantel.

I promise I haven't moved anything. Yes, it's total case. and the books are too deep. It takes forever to find the one you want. I'm currently working my way through the Lucy Barton series by the amazing Elizabeth Strout and might dive into big dunk just for the hell of it. The alternative is my first foray into Ken Follett, circle of days. So either way, I'd be channeling Jane. Thank you so much for the pod, which keeps me sane and cheers me up through all life throws at me. I'm about to start chemotherapy after some ill health shenanigans this year. are sending you all our love, Kath,

and obviously we hope that we can keep you company as well in what's going to just be such a horrible, sick-making, nasty way to be spending your time, but we really, really hope that things get brighter. And Kath wanted to say as well that she had a similar reaction as Jane to Disclosure Day, my partner loved it, I just felt I'd missed the point somehow, and it was too long.

And following Eve's experience of going to the wrong Greek island, I'm never going to live that town, I wanted to tell you about a holiday experience where I led a friend book everything and only on arrival did I find out we were on a club 8 into 30 holiday. Not my scene at all. I was 32 and felt like everybody's mum.

I decided to just embrace it there in the end and had a lovely holiday fling with a young man called Fergus. I still think about it every now and again. It was wonderful. Kath, well, I mean, think about it as often as you like. How absolutely fantastic. I always thought with Club 18 to 13.

was there a strict age limit check, you know, where when you booked, and on your passport details you revealed that you were 32, you'd actually be banned from coming in. Because surely there would have been quite a few perves. Sort of begs the question, what's the point of it if you can go on your 38? Yes, yeah, and you definitely shouldn't be. No. No.

Maybe it is a kind of indicator, but then, yeah, they would have been a couple of perks. I chose to ignore it. But just also the 18 to 30 limit is weird. And would I want my 18-year-old teenagers, either gender, going on a holiday where there were lots of 30-year-olds? No. Yeah. No.

And as a 30-year-old, you've got to look at your friends a bit funny if they want to go on. No, no, definitely, definitely. But, Kath, the reason why I've put why on this is because you've got so many books twice. So you've got two copies and... Oh, okay. No, I've been foolish there. you've got two copies of Philip Pullman's the book of Dust but one's volume two

of the other's volume three so we'll let you have that but you do have two exact copies of Harper Lee go set of watchman I mean like exact copies right next to each other so why has that happened and do they both mean something to you and you are incredibly well read there are so many Hillary Mantell's a good mix

it's a very good mix and then you've also got Noel Gallagher's high flying birds I didn't realize that was a book. Is it a book of film? Did you not? And a TV show. Is it? That's passed me by.

And you've also got, I think it must be an autobiography of Huey Morgan, the fun-loving criminal, which is right next to Barack Obama, a promised land. So these are all great. And we'd like more of those, actually. If you've got something funny,

standing against something funny. Yeah. I can feel a little bit of an Instagram hit coming on, can't be. I think if you were to rent out Kath's house as a holiday home you'd be quite well set if that was the bookshelf on offer wouldn't you just you'd be delighted there are about ten books in here that I just never even realised

have been published and I would absolutely love to read them you've got thirst by John Robbins up against Stephen Frye Odyssey I don't like that because Stephen Fry hasn't written the Odyssey somebody else got there first it's not Stephen Fry's Odyssey I can see how that would It's just really It just really

It's not right Stephen Back off love Back off And you've also got death in a strange country Which is my favourite Donnellian book Of all time So Kath, good luck my lovely We are with you every step of the way

A fantastic suggestion We're talking about cold books Won't we to read In case you just got a little bit too hot Imogen says Woman in the Polar Night By Christine Ritter Have you come across that?

I have not. No, okay. It was published in the 30s in Germany and hasn't been out of print since. My daughter bought it for me for my birthday. It was absolutely brilliant. Such an interesting woman and story. The descriptions of life in a hunting cabin in Svalbard

through the winter have stayed with me. Absolutely magical. And Imogen signs off by saying at the risk of sounding like a twat. We've also been planning on a new ski trip and that's helped. Sounds good. Sounds good. Anything that takes your mind. off.

Hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot, hot. Final one, and then we'll explain what our guesting situation is over the last couple of days, Eve, if that's okay. Oh, I tell you what, actually. Could we just ask Sarah to send her picture of the Catanema? Sarah sends the email.

I thought you might like to see the Catanema my son set up the other night. Please excuse the state of the facility we're mid-building project, but the walls are serving as a great screen, mittens and fluffy were delighted at their front row seats. So this is obviously a cinema for cats, isn't it? Obviously.

But I clicked on it and I couldn't open it. Dead Dog from a plane is the last one. Nikki says, I've come back from holiday. I'm catching up on the podcast. But the dead dog in a suitcase story reminded me of my brother, who's a pilot in South Africa. At the time he was a flight instructor at a small airfield on the coast and was approaching the car park by an upset old lady.

She explained her beloved dog had died and wanted his final resting place to be in the sea that he loved so much. My brother is a kind soul and agreed to take the remains up, thinking he was going to scatter some ashes as he flew over the sea, so they went to her car. Bear in mind, he mainly flew in small two-seater Cessna's similar in size to the original mini. So imagine his shock when she opened the boot and there was a dead full-size Alsatian dog. I still don't know how he did it, but the dog is now somewhere in the Indian Ocean, enjoying his afterlife in the waves.

Now, Nikki, I mean, how, so you just... So many questions. Should you be opening the door on a small plane and shoving out... Looks so suspicious. A big dead dog. I mean, I just don't think, is that safe? Did the dog eventually wash up somewhere?

Does it sink? Yeah, I mean, just what... But also, what's a horrible way to... Really dark. So, Nikki, we're with you on that. That's just really bonkers. And I mean, I'm sure that she wanted her beloved dog, you know, to obviously have a significant final resting place.

But I think better to cremate first. It's just going to hit the boys with such an impact. And how do you even get it onto the plane in the first place? It must have literally been like carrying a dead body. Yes, yeah. No, very, very strange. It's quite strange. Very, very strange indeed.

Can I just put something out there, and I don't mean to be too macabre, but when various pets have died over the years, and they've all been cremated, and some of them have been scattered, some of them have been buried, some are stood in the cupboard. But why does the body become heavier after it's died? Or is that just, I imagine, to be heavier? Is there a thing that happens? We're back into bad taxidermy, aren't we?

I feel like it does get heavier, but I don't know why either. Why would that be? It's a bit weird, isn't it? Right, we leave you with that thought. Like I say, I'm very, very sorry. Enjoy, happy Monday. We didn't think that that's what we were going to end on.

Let's think again about lovely teachers. Now, we're doing something a little bit different. We're not having two big guests for today and tomorrow because we wanted to talk about AI on the podcast. It's part of our ongoing small, middle-aged female campaign to just stay in it, understand, it, not be frightened by it, and kind of get a bit more on board. So today, we are talking about finance and how AI can really, really help us, and also some of the things that we should be

a bit wary of. So we hope you can feast your mind over this and find something informative, educational and entertaining, which was a slogan of a previous corporation that we worked at that then decided it didn't need us working there anymore. We're going to talk about AI and money now. We're going to do it in the company of Lawrence White, who is UK banking correspondent at Reuters, and Harriet Reese, who's group CIO at Starling, both in the studio with me. You're both very welcome. We've got so much to pack into this time, so let's get going. Harriet, what can I do now that is produced by AI or governed by AI that I just couldn't even have dreamt about doing, let's say five years ago?

Well, we all remember the days of having to print off one's bank statement and get the highlighter pen out so that you could review your spending last month. And of course, digital banking brought that to the mobile. And we were able to then see what we'd spent in our applications. But AI has now enabled us to really break down the sort of the barrier that was there for consumers when it comes to understanding their spending. So in the Starling app, for example, you can now go in and say, how much should I spend on coffee last month? or how much should I spend on my bills last year? And these are questions that really lower the barrier to entry

for people to actually understand where their money is going and then hopefully adopt and evolve their habits so that they can be much more healthy and financially savvy. So effectively AI is acting as the sensible voice that we should always have had in our head about money but quite a few of us have just completely ignored. I think it's about just having the knowledge. I think ultimately for a lot of people,

it was too easy for understanding your finances to be something that was considered too difficult, too abstract, because it required several steps before you could get that level of information. But today, with the power of conversational AI, and I'm talking about using LLMs under the hood, we can really break that down and help people to have the power and the knowledge that they need within their hands. You're also doing an awful lot of work to help us avoid scams, aren't you? How does that work? Yeah, we really are. So I'm sure your listeners will be aware that there is an epidemic in the UK at the moment.

when it comes to fraud, and UK consumers in particular are really struggling with this. So, you know, the banks at large have been trying behind the scenes to improve their fraud detection capabilities over the last few years, but ultimately the fraudsters are still winning, and the losses from a volume and value perspective are increasing. So at Starling, we chose to use AI and, again, to put the power of AI into the hands of our customers. And we've launched something called scam intelligence, which allows people to upload images of Facebook marketplace listing, or other online listings, and simply to have a conversation with an AI tool about what the risks may be with regards to this payment. So we might say this price looks a little too good to be true.

We might say, have you met the seller? We might say, why don't you ask a few more questions about this? And then recently, with the help of Cecilia, who was the victim of the Tinder swindler scams, some of you might have seen this on Netflix, we've actually evolved the capability of the tool to cover a number of other scams, including investment scams and romance scams, so that our consumers, can actually have a conversation with the application about payments that they might be making and we will prompt them to say,

okay, have you met the person who's asking you for this money? Why are they rushing you to send this money? Again, just to bring those sort of red flags to the customer's attention and hopefully stop them making those fraudulent payments. So all of that sounds absolutely lovely. AI is creating guardrails that make us safer in terms of how our money is handled.

But Lawrence, everybody's big fear with AI and we're right to be fearful because people who've made AI tell us we should be fearful of when it goes rogue and starts doing something that is completely unforeseen. And when that's with our money, that is terrifying. Scary, yes, and I think obviously a lot of the work we've been doing recently in Reuters is looking into some of the risks associated with AI.

The big one that was in the news recently was around Mythos Anthropics latest release, which has the potential we've been told to detect vulnerabilities so-called zero-day exploits in bank systems much faster than had previously been possible so the fraudsters and scammers who are out there can use these programs to find vulnerabilities in bank systems and someone at a bank recently told me it's gone from weeks and days from these vulnerabilities being found to when the attack will come to minutes so that's one big area where AI is sort of accelerating the risks as well as the systemic risks building up which a lot of

people worry about if banks and traders start using this stuff and they're all using the same models, you can see the potential risks there. Very much so. So, Harriet, how do you mitigate against exactly those kind of things happening at a bank? Well, I think there's two things to say. The first is to, to, of course, acknowledge the risk in the short term, but actually to acknowledge the opportunity in what Lawrence has just outlined. Because actually with tools like mythos, if within the development cycle we are able to spot and identify those vulnerabilities earlier, where there are patches to those vulnerabilities, they can be implemented sooner. So actually the future state is that we will identify these

before these products and softwares are even shipped to production. I think what we're in now is an interim state where we know that there are vulnerabilities out there that we have not yet caught through traditional methods and therefore we need to expedite patching those and mitigating those vulnerabilities in this moment, which the sector at large has responded to. There's been a huge movement from regulators and banks alike

to really expedite the activity in this space. and with the inception of that understanding about these vulnerabilities being out there, I think that there's a positive movement for the industry when it comes to security. So you talked about AI keeping us safer because it's making us more aware of scams. But what happens if AI actually starts scamming us? Yeah, I think we need to be really cognizant about where the line is when it comes to the autonomy that we give to, in particular, agentic systems. And Starling's actually...

What do you mean by agentic systems? Agentic systems would be an AI system that has the ability to take an action on your behalf. And this is the direction of travel that we're seeing in the industry and more broadly in AI. And I think that, again, there is a lot of potential here for consumers. But we have to think very carefully about how we protect consumers and ensure that consumers understand and are comfortable with the actions that any AI assistant or agent would be taking on their behalf. So, Starling, we've actually been experimenting with this. We were the first UK bank to launch an AI assistant with Agenic.

capability. Through the assistant, you can set up spaces, which are individual petitions within your account, to transfer money and start saving, etc. And we have required that for every agentic action, the human is required to approve each single action so that we can prove that our customers really understand what the AI system is carrying out. If you did a survey, Lawrence, of, let's say, 100 banking customers for any high street bank or online bank across a wide age range. How many people do you think would say that all sounds whizzy-woo and remarkable? But I'd like to go into a bank and still be able to talk to somebody. Why is that taking the opportunity for human interaction and confidence away from me? Yes, and of course you probably

can't because there aren't many branches left for a lot of these banks anymore. And that's one risk of this AI that it makes, increases this trend of banking becoming more remote. Everything's online, everything is through the app, which is fine when it works, but not when it doesn't. I think what we're seeing with the agentic AI stuff that Harriet's just been talking about so far is I think a lot of people are willing to use AI to help them search. You know, if you can imagine what mortgage should I get, you put a prompt into an AI model and it'll spit out some answers. What banks are also worried about is that's, you want to be discoverable in that process

so my bank gets recommended, but also what are the risks if I'm then being seen to have given advice as a bank for somebody to buy this mortgage or that financial. product and it then goes wrong, whose fault is that? Is it chat GPT's fault or is it the Spank's fault? So I think that's another thing at the moment. I think most of your listeners will have tinkered with AI to try and recommend, you know, it's brilliant at planning a holiday and then you go and actually check it and all the train times are wrong and it actually doesn't work. So I think we're at that stage now where people are tinkering and they're using it to help them search for things but not necessarily trusting it yet. But there'll come a time where the whole transaction could in theory be done

within the AI model and that obviously has huge potential to disintermediate marketplaces like Amazon or whatever if all of your transaction is done within an AI platform. Yeah, so you just ask one simple question and the whole thing is done for you.

Some of the language is a little bit confusing, isn't it, to first time users? And in fact, Jerry says what's the LM under the hood? I think it was LLM, which stands for a large language model. and this is the capability that has been evolving over the course of the last couple of years,

which we term generally as generative AI. So examples of models in this space would be chat, GPT, Gemini, Claude, for example. And these are the models that are often used under the hood and then trained either on specific data sets or on specific applications by banks in the UK to carry out these specific applications. So to Lawrence's point,

if something is wrong within that system, it's been wrong within the scrape of information and your bank allows it to go ahead. Is it your fault? Is it my fault? Is it Gemini's fault? Whose fault is it? I think we need to be very careful about thinking about the sort of layers of liability here. As a regulated bank, it's obviously very important that anything that we put into our application has been vetted by us.

So before we put anything to production, we do rigorous testing, control testing, sample testing, to make sure we're comfortable with the outputs. But we accept that on occasion, LLMs do hallucinate, and hence, as I'm, I spoke about earlier with the agenetic capability that we have built in, we require our customers to approve themselves any action that this NLM is carrying out so that we know that the customer themselves has confirmed that that action is the correct action. And I think that given where the capability of these models are, is today, it's really important that we put those, those protections in place so that we've got as much confidence in each stage of the process as

we go through this journey. But the regulation hasn't changed, has it? And, And surely that's the problem too? So the regulation that's in place today requires banks to ensure that the technology or the products that we put out there for consumers is there for the good of the consumer, right? Ultimately does not harm the consumer. And that wrapper is around anything that we put out there to consumers and therefore applies to AI.

The regulation also requires us to understand model constructs, requires us to be able to explain what models are doing and requires us to have audit trails across all stages of what a model applies. So the regulation per se doesn't need to change because we do already have model model governance and model risk management in place. But I would absolutely expect us to be having to think more carefully about where regulation goes in a world of agentic payments, in a world of agentic commerce, in a world where agentic and autonomous systems start to emerge more rapidly across the industry. Now you see, I feel strangely discomforted by all of

that, Lawrence. Am I alone in that? No, and of course the piece we haven't talked about at all is is I think everyone's biggest fear with AI that it's going to steal our jobs. And I think a change that we've seen in the last few months really is that banks have become a little bit more honest or a little bit more blunt about the impact that all this stuff is going to have

on jobs within bank, which is obviously a huge employer in Britain. I think a few years ago banks would have said, oh, this is all just freeing up capability so our staff have more time on their hands to do more things that aren't mundane tasks that AI is now doing. I think you've seen the likes of standard chartered CEO

Bill Winters, HSBC's boss, come out and say, look, we are going to cut jobs because this stuff is making it much more efficient to do all the boring back office stuff in banks, processing documents, reading documents, logging customer interactions, all of that kind of stuff. So I think we are going to see in the next few years a real transformation of the banking industry. No one knows how big that is, but there was a Morgan Stanley report last year saying 200,000 jobs gone in European banking in the next five years. And a lot of your listeners may say, oh, boo-hoo, poor bankers. But these are are often, you know, not people earning millions and millions of pounds, but people slaving away in the back office, doing routine work, a lot of those jobs are likely to go over the next few

years. And obviously, that makes the bank more efficient. But just like any area of employment, this is something that is going to be a concern, I think, for a lot of people over the next few years, just how many jobs will go. And do you think, going right back to Harriot's original point, that we are going to become more financially literate because we simply have an ability now to ask questions about our money of people who we might not have actually booked an appointment with down at Barclays on a Saturday afternoon at 3.30, gone along, talked about our finances?

That's certainly the hope. I mean, in a sense, it's democratising access to all of this advice, but it's only democratising access to it for people who are sort of already quite online. So I think that's the concern. Is it going to bring in lots of people who aren't already comfortable using the internet, using online search platforms?

so perhaps very young and very older customers will still face that barrier, I think, even if the tools are there and they're a bit sharper than they used to be. Do you think it might change the gender barrier? Because there definitely is one in terms of female investing and in terms of female wealth, actually. Do you think this changes that? Yeah, to Lawrence's point, I think there's absolutely the potential to break down some of the barriers, be it for genders, socially economic backgrounds, age, etc. Actually, from our own experience launching our assistant, our agentic assistant, we expected, you know, our most tech savvy users to be the ones that became the heaviest users sort of straight up after launch.

And actually, it really wasn't. It was customers who were perhaps new to the bank and didn't know their way around it or perhaps had quite basic questions about sort of how the app worked, what support there was. They found using this assistant and being able to type or speak in natural language a much more user-friendly interface than navigating across an app. So I think it's really important when we talk about sort of the perhaps discomfort about the direction that the industry as a whole accepts that we will have a spectrum in society for the next five, ten years even, of people who maybe don't want to explore banking where they are and people who do. And I think it's important that it's not a binary choice, actually,

that we keep the options there for people who don't want to use it, but also allow people to explore and get the benefits when they would like to. So I think many customers feel that that choice has already been taken away from them, though. I mean, they can't physically go to a bank anymore. That is the thin end of quite a big wedge, isn't it? Yes, for banks like Starland, of course, we were born digitally and born remotely. But we've always lent into the juxtaposition of being a digital bank, but also requiring human input when it comes to banking and finances.

And hence here in the UK, we have a 24-7 call centre operation, which is completely human-maned. We think it's really important. I find that very interesting. You have recognised something that is so important to people. When you get into difficulty, I do not want to have an online chat with a bot. I really, really need to talk to either Brian or Eileen, a person. Actually, in my own time zone as well, who understands my frustration.

Can you commit to keeping that workforce, though? We have absolutely no plans to replace that human core centre workforce that's based here in the UK with AI. The challenge for us is to build something with AI that's always there and even better and has all the answers in a way that's even more intuitive to customers. And of course, we'll try to rise to that challenge. But today we know this is really important to our customers. And we know that that's something that people come to Starling for.

Here's a great big bombshell to end on, Lawrence. Isn't all of this making it really much more possible for bad actors to take us all down? If a foreign bad actor wanted to take out all of our money from our savings accounts in the UK, it would leave us going to the FSA to try and get the money. back and that were bankrupt to government, wouldn't it? Yeah, that risk has always been there, though. I don't think that's an AI-specific risk. And people in Harriet's job at other banks have sort of echoed her.

There are teams of bankers, people working in these institutions, sat there every day, finding these vulnerabilities, patching them up, spending billions of pounds every year trying to avoid that. I don't think AI has unlocked some great new capability to attack these banks. It's just made it easier and faster for certain bad actors to. to find vulnerabilities in bank systems and then try and exploit them. So in a sense, those risks were always there. But yeah, it's definitely something to worry about.

And because you look across this big horizon, Lawrence, I will leave the final word to you. Are you optimistic that actually we enter a different age of our relationship with money through AI, or are you pessimistic? Probably pessimistic. if we look through the history of banking, I think these new technologies, they've never really changed the fundamentals,

which is, you know, banks pay out 3% on deposits. They charge 5% on those. None of that's going to change. And I think my biggest worry, if I leave with one message, is it's just going to accelerate this trend for banking to be a little bit more remote and more impersonal, that it's great when everything's working

and your app is recommending all these products to you, but to your point earlier, when things go wrong and you want to call and you want to speak to a human, and I worry that banks are going to find ways to cut that capacity or move it elsewhere and it's all going to be more impersonal. Well, we heard a guarantee from Harriet that her bank sterling has no intention of doing that at the moment. We'll keep that clip.

It's lovely of you both to come into the studio. We really appreciate it. Thank you very much indeed for your time. Harriet Reese and Lawrence White, any things that come out of that that are bothering you, they'll probably be bothering us as well. So it's Jane and Fee at times.radio. Jane is away for this week.

I'm away for next week, but Eve is absolutely superb at filling in for both of us. I'm sure you will agree. And also she remains the brains behind all of the threads in the podcast. So don't think you can't send something in now because it's for Jane or for me next week because just send it in and Eve puts it all in these very special little boxes. I don't.

I just pretend you do, darling. Pretend you do. Bye. Bye. Congratulations. You've staggered somehow to the end of another Offair with Jane and Fee.

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