Financial technology provider Bottomline has launched the Payer Name Verification service, which is an expansion of Confirmation of Payee (CoP). Pay.UK’s Payer Name Verification service will be offered through Bottomline Payments Services Limited and will assure businesses that payments are being collected from the named account holder when processing Direct Debits.

Pay.UK’s Confirmation of Payee (CoP) name-checking service for UK-based payments was launched in 2020 and has been implemented by more than 80 UK banks, building societies, and other payment service providers (PSPs) according to investorsobserver.com. Payer Name Verification represents an expansion of this original service. Bottomline representatives cited by the same source emphasised the company’s commitment to helping businesses fight threats on all fronts.

They also offered more information about this new product and explained its core principles. In essence, Payer Name Verification confirms that the provided bank account details belong to the named business or individual, giving companies greater confidence that the Direct Debit is being set up by the actual account holder thus helping minimise the risk of an indemnity claim. Direct Debit is a popular solution for the conventional payment of bills, and according to a report from UK Finance, 4.6 billion Direct Debits worth GBP 1,243 billion were processed in 2021.

The report also describes Direct Debit as a familiar, long-established, and widely trusted method for paying regular bills, which is why it is used by nine out of ten UK consumers. Payer Name Verification can help the companies that collect these Direct Debits to protect themselves against the risk of chargebacks while also minimising costs associated with manually verifying account holders. Bottomline’s Confirmation of Payee (CoP) for businesses Bottomline launched Confirmation of Payee (CoP) for businesses in January 2023 to help in the fight against authorised push payment (APP) fraud.

The official press release cited a report from UK Finance, which revealed that authorised push payment fraud (APP) losses stood at GBP 583 million in 2021 (a 22% increase from 2020) and at GBP 249 million for the first half of 2022. To help prevent APP fraud, the UK’s Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) has mandated that financial institutions have CoP incorporated into their consumer banking services. However, Bottomline went one step further and released CoP for Business for companies of all sizes in a bid to help them protect themselves.

This product launch came in the context of increased fraud levels that affected banks, companies, and consumers. CoP helps free up manual effort by providing companies with a new tool for checking if payments are directed to legitimately owned bank accounts. For more information about Bottomline, please check out their detailed profile in our dedicated, industry-specific Company Database.

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