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Confirmation of Payee

Two women sat in front of computers, one wearing a headset, and looking at the screen.

Payments

Confirmation of Payee

Do you really know who you're paying?

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How we could help Open in new window

CoP solutions Open in new window

How it works Open in new window

Avoid scams Open in new window

How we could help your business

Trust and security are essential when it comes to managing your business finances. That’s why we’ve introduced Confirmation of Payee (CoP) — a name-checking service designed to help protect your business from fraud and ensure your payments reach the right destination.

Confirmation of Payee (CoP) is a name checking service that checks the name of the account holder you intend to pay, along with their account details when making a new single sterling UK payment or a single CHAPS payment using Bankline.

The CoP check has been introduced to help reduce fraud and to give you more confidence when making payments.

Will every Bank offer a CoP service?

No, if a payment provider has not registered for this service, you may get a notification that the account is not registered with the CoP service.

Will the CoP check slow down my payments?

No. The check is made in real-time before the payment is formally requested, so you’ll see the response immediately.

Can CoP stop a payment being made?

No, you must decide whether to proceed with the payment once you've read the CoP response.

If you receive a close match or no match response and decide to continue without checking that the payee details are correct and that the payment request is genuine, we may not be able to recover the money you send if it goes to an unintended recipient.

Does CoP apply to my debit card payments?

No. Initially CoP is focused on “push payment” transactions.

These are payments that you make and authorise using your bank account.

Typically, these will be the payments you make from Bankline, Online Banking or your mobile application.

Our CoP solutions

Payments made to you

It’s important you give whoever is making a payment into your account, your business or trading name that’s registered on your account.

If your account name changes then don’t forget to let people know.

Information Message

Payments you make

When you set up a new single sterling UK payment, or change an existing one, a CoP check will be made against the name on the account you want to pay by their bank.

Information Message

How it works

The CoP check will generate one of four responses:

Yes

You’ll receive confirmation all the details match.

Close Match

This means the name on the account doesn’t exactly match what you have provided.

No Match

It’s not a match, contact the person or business you are trying to pay to confirm the correct details.

Unavailable

There may be occasions when a CoP check is unavailable.

You must remember to:

Contact the person or business you’re making the payment to, to check the name on their account
If you’re paying a person, use their first and last name
If you’re paying a business, use the business or trading name registered to their account
When prompted to do so, please make sure you select the correct type of account for the person or business you are paying

Who decides whether the CoP check is a match, close match or no match?

The payees bank or building society receiving the payment will decide if the name and account details sent to them for the CoP check match or not.

They’ll send their response to the sender’s bank or building society, and this will be shown to the payer as a message.

If you don’t get a match you should contact the person or business you are trying to pay to confirm the account name, sort code and account number.

Do I need to know whether the account I’m making a payment to is a personal or business account?

Yes. This information is important and helps the recipient's payment provider to decide which CoP check response to return.

Our online payment channels will have a field available that lets you choose whether the account details belong to a personal or business account.

How should I check the payees name?

If you are making a payment in response to an email from an executive or another colleague in your organisation, and you get a no match response, then speak to the person who sent the message, either in person or over the phone, to check the request is genuine.

When calling that person, use a telephone number you know to be correct – don’t rely on any telephone numbers quoted in the email itself.

If you are making a payment to a supplier and you get a no match response, then speak to someone you know at the company concerned, using a number you know to be genuine.

If you have received the beneficiary account details via email, do not use any telephone numbers quoted in the email itself.

Exercise caution if you have received correspondence, supposedly from the supplier, claiming that their bank account details have recently changed.

Avoid scams and help reduce fraud

The CoP check can help you avoid making new single sterling UK payments or single CHAPS payments using Bankline to the wrong account, as well as supporting the fight against fraud and scams.

When checking the payment details, it’s important to contact the person or business on a number you trust.

Never use the phone number from an email or text exchange which can be faked by the criminal to trick you into believing it’s genuine.
Never be pressurised into continuing with the payment when the details don’t fully match or where the account can’t be checked.

Visit our security centre to learn more about how to protect yourself from fraud.

Visit the Security Centre Open in new window

Will it stop fraud completely?

No, unfortunately not, but it’s important to remember that CoP is one of a range of measures, some already implemented and others, including CoP, which are being introduced by the industry to help reduce fraud.

You have an important part to play in helping us to prevent fraud and scams - by carefully analysing the CoP response and only proceeding after you have checked that the details are correct.

Will my data be secure?

Yes, payment providers will use the Open Banking directory service and highly secure architecture to safely exchange CoP requests.

In addition, to be accredited to use the system payment providers must undergo rigorous security checks and they are also regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority or European equivalents.

Learn more about Open Banking here

Once CoP is implemented, who is liable if a payment goes to the wrong place?

For scam payments

CoP is linked to the Contingent Reimbursement Model (CRM) for Authorised Push Payment Scams.

The CRM outlines where liability should lie if money is lost. This is dependent on several different variables.

Liability could ultimately lie with the victim’s bank, the scammer’s (recipient) bank, the victim or some combination of those different parties.

What happens if I make a payment by mistake?

The bank the payment was made from will contact the payees bank. The payees bank then has a certain amount of time to contact their customer and ask for permission to return the funds.

The return of the funds cannot be guaranteed.

Contact us

Already a customer?

Get in touch with your relationship manager to learn more about our solutions or call Businessline on

03457 11 44 77

18001 03457 11 44 77 Relay UK

Monday to Friday 9am-5pm (excl. public holidays) for lending and other specialist business banking enquiries. Our call centres are open 24/7 for basic banking enquiries.

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