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The Family

The use of ICT in the home is becoming more widespread as new advances are made. The family described in this context are fictional and have reasonably up-to-date ICT equipment in their home - not everyone will have all of the things in their home!

The family consists of:

Jay Peterson (46)

A manager of a local company who earns £36,000 per year. Jay has several diaries which mostly contain business contacts and appointments. However, he also has family and friends' numbers in them. His personal accounts are done when the time can be found and all of the transactions, such as Switch receipts, are stacked up in a pile until either he or his wife gets around to sorting them. He reads a newspaper daily and likes to catch up on current affairs if he has time. He would like a system that will enable the family to collate all the addresses etc and also prove a means by which data can be easily retrieved and used. Finally, he would like a system to take care of his accounts.

Helen Peterson (44)

A teacher at the local primary school and earns £22,000 per year. Helen also has diaries and address books of friends', family and business addresses and details. Like her husband, she places all of her financial transactions into a file and only tackles it when there is time. She too likes to read a newspaper each day but would prefer to have a wider access to world events. She would like a system to organise all the separate items of data into one central resource that any of them could use. Helen would also like to make the household accounts more efficient as she finds the present system very worrying.

Phillip Peterson (19)

Works at the local council offices and earns £7,500 per year, of which he contributes £20 per week to the family income. Phillip’s main interest in ICT would be in all aspects of communication and the WWW. He would like a system to include Internet access and would like to be able to get up to the minute information about it. He is also keen to use digital television and use its interactive services.

Gemma Peterson (17)

Is currently studying for GNVQ in Business at the local college. Gemma is a very organised person and despairs at the way the family deals with birthdays, Christmas cards, anniversaries and other family occasions. She wants to develop the use of a computer system that will help them to organise their data effectively, to have an accounts package or program and other software applications that would help her with her studies at college. Although they use a lot of ICT in their home Gemma does not feel that the family uses it effectively in their everyday lives. All too often addresses are lost and birthdays are forgotten; bills are forgotten as the finances are so disorganised.

Gemma has persuaded the family that ICT methods could be found that will make all of their lives more efficient. The family has agreed to finance improvement of their computer system. Gemma must decide what system will be efficient, cost effective, easy to maintain and easy to use.

As a friend of the family, and a specialist in ICT, you have been asked to help Gemma in her task and to develop a system which will encourage the family to use ICT.

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