The Help Desk

Knowing who to ask is half the answer.
Sources of help and guidance
?
The narrator

Welcome to the help desk. People are going to come and sit across from you with a money problem, and your job is not to solve it yourself. It is to point them to the right source of help. There are nine to choose from, and the best one depends entirely on the situation. Some are free, some cost money. Some are impartial, some are not. Some are regulated, some are anonymous strangers on the internet. Pick well, and you send someone away with the right kind of help. Pick badly, and you could send them somewhere that charges them, misleads them, or even scams them.

What you'll do

  • Eight people arrive at the desk, one at a time, each with a different situation.
  • For each, choose one or more of the nine sources of help you would point them to. Or choose "not a job for any of these" if none of them fits.
  • Get immediate feedback that explains the fit, and the advantages and disadvantages of each source.
  • At the end, see your score, the key lessons, and a reference card listing all nine sources.
9Sources
8People
~7Minutes

Why this matters

There is no single best place to go for money help. The right source depends on the question, and the sources differ in four big ways: cost, impartiality, regulation and expertise. Free help exists for debt and official rules. Personalised, regulated advice costs a fee. A bank only talks about its own products. A forum can be a scam. The skill is matching the person in front of you to the source that actually suits them.