Bringing protection against fraud

Each year, thousands of businesses are victim to authorised push payment (APP) fraud. In 2018, APP scams cost UK consumers £345m, of which only £83m was recovered.

Confirmation of Payee (CoP) aims to fight APP fraud by ensuring customers are sending payments to the intended recipient and avoid misdirected payments by adding a layer of protection. In other words, it is an ‘account name checking service’ that can help avoid payments being accidentally misdirected.

APP frauds occur where a customer is pushed into authorising a money transfer to an account they believe is a legitimate payee. Going forward, CoP will require customers to know the exact name details of the business as stated on the invoice or on their payment instruction. Business will need to provide the exact account name or trading name to anyone they wish to receive a payment from. Making CoP available to payers will help SMEs prevent misdirected payments and will offer more protection as part of their payment experience.

The roll out of CoP is underway and financial institutions will begin enabling it for specific banking channels (telephone, mobile, in-branch, online, etc.) from 31 March 2020. UK Finance has published guidance for consumers and business on Confirmation of Payee that can be accessed here.

The guidance includes practical information such as a CoP checklist on what businesses need to do when receiving and making payments and how CoP will affect businesses.

If you would like to know more about CoP, please get in touch with the Financial Services team at the CBI -  Ana Gallego

Read the UK Finance guidance, here.