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Founded by Catherine Fitzpatrick in 2023, Flequity Ventures is a social enterprise on a mission to disrupt financial abuse and gender bias through smarter product and service design. We work to protect women from economic harm, tackle inequality, and change harmful behaviour.
Let’s inspire change for women’s financial safety and empowerment.
We’re a specialist, independent consultancy. Our experience in designing, implementing and embedding large-scale transformations in big business sets us apart. We use the power of that experience to help our clients reimagine and redesign their products and services.
We bring together the right experts for every project, working with our strategic partners and a collective of consultants committed to financial safety.
We partner with businesses to tailor safety by design and gender impact assessments to enhance their customer experience, risk management and reputation. We partner with industry to advocate for systemic changes across sectors to drive better protection and access for millions of customers.
At the heart of everything we do are the voices of lived experience. We partner with others to bring this perspective to our projects, and recognise that we build on the legacy of pioneers in women’s safety.
If you’re ready to make an impact with us, get in touch.
Good business.
As a social enterprise, we exist to do good.
We reinvest 50% of our profits to fight financial abuse and gender discrimination. Through impact initiatives and advocacy, we aim to inspire people and businesses to think differently, design to disrupt and level up. We want to make the unseen visible and change unstoppable.
Why do we focus on financial abuse?
In Australia, 1 in 6 women and 1 in 13 men have faced economic abuse – almost as common as physical violence.
Financial abuse, a form of coercive control, occurs in more than 90% of domestic abuse but remains a hidden epidemic.
It often continues long after a relationship ends and can be a reason women are forced to choose between violence and poverty.
Businesses are uniquely placed to reduce and eliminate financial abuse.
“If we can change how businesses design products and services, we can unlock gender equality.”
Catherine Fitzpatrick
Our founder.
Catherine Fitzpatrick
Catherine Fitzpatrick is the #1 international authority on financial safety by design. A former bank senior executive turned social entrepreneur creating impactful change for over two decades.
She founded Flequity in 2023 to show that innovation in design can be the new frontier of social impact – tackling gender inequality while solving customer problems, promoting fairness, and opening new doors for growth.
Her ground-breaking Designed to Disrupt™ reports and #respectandprotect campaign have catalysed 30+ Australian businesses representing more than 15 million customers across the finance, telecommunications, water, education, and technology sectors to ban the misuse of their products and services for financial abuse.
Catherine is a social entrepreneur, award-winning author, adviser, and advocate for change. Named an AFR|Qantas Woman of Influence in 2018, in 2024, Catherine was recognised with a Shared Value Individual Bravery Award and Flequity with a National Consumer Advocacy Award alongside the Centre for Women’s Economic Safety and CHOICE.
She is an Adjunct Associate Professor at the UNSW School of Social Sciences, Chair of the ANU Student Safety and Wellbeing Committee, and expert adviser to the Australian and NSW governments and the International Finance Corporation.