On 11 October 2022, the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) released Policy Statement 22/3 ‘Extending confirmation of payee coverage’ (PS22/3).
In PS22/3 the PSR confirms its plans to direct about 400 payment service providers (PSPs) to implement a system to offer the Confirmation of Payee (CoP) name checking service to their customers (both as payers and payees). This is the latest step that the PSR has taken since August 2019 when it issued a specific direction to require the six largest banking groups to implement CoP.
The PSR has identified two groups of firms which need to implement the CoP system and has set out requirements for each:
- Group 1: focuses on firms that will need to use the CoP system after 31 October 2023.
- Group 2: All other firms that use unique sort codes, or are building societies using alternative reference information, to use the CoP systems after 31 October 2024.
The PSR will give 12 months to Group 1 to implement CoP and 24 months to Group 2 to implement CoP.
The PSR has prioritised Group 1 based on the complexity and size of the institutions, and on the impact the PSP adopting CoP is likely to have on preventing authorised push payment scams.
