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The National Payments Vision is necessary for renewal, payments industry insiders have said, as they called on the authorities to act now to provide greater clarity and reduce complexity.
The UK government needs to outline a plan for world-class payments infrastructure, speakers at the Travers Smith Future of Fintech conference said during a panel discussion that took place on Thursday (September 19).
The idea of a National Payments Vision was prompted by the Future of Payments Review, which was led by Joe Garner, former CEO of Nationwide Building Society, and came out in November 2023.
The review offered ten recommendations to enhance consumer experience, promote open banking and improve regulatory alignment.
Its key finding was that the UK payments landscape is congested and needs a clear strategy.
The UK government said that it would publish the National Payments Vision “as soon as possible later this year”.
That was in March 2024, however, and there is still no sign of it.
Time for a clear vision
The payments industry is no doubt sympathetic to the challenges of the change of government in the UK, with a new minister from a different party now taking the lead on payments at the Treasury.
Nevertheless, there is a sense that the sector remains restless about the lack of movement from government and regulators on key initiatives that could unlock investment and increase regulatory certainty.
Addressing the conference, Jack Wilson, TrueLayer’s VP of policy and research, emphasised that rejuvenation for UK payments is necessary.
“Competing with cards requires the Faster Payment System [FPS] to work really well, and be responsive, fast and reliable,” he said.
Wilson acknowledged that the FPS is “pretty old now” and said that the National Payments Vision is “really welcome”.
“This is something that can prioritise infrastructure renewal,” he said.
“The government talks about having world-class roads and world-class rail but if we want our economy to grow and we want investment to come in, then we need world-class payment infrastructure,” he added.
Wilson pointed out that the New Payments Architecture, a UK initiative that began to be developed in 2015, had many good starting points for the National Payments Vision and could serve as a “blueprint” for the government’s payments plans.
“We want the National Payments Vision to get work back on track,” he said.
Reducing complexity
Fellow panellist Betsy Dorudi, head of public policy at ClearBank, agreed with Wilson, saying that her recommendation for payments policy is for the government to “proceed with speed”.
Dorudi also called for a “single rulebook for payments”, noting that the compliance rules for payments are “complex”.
“Payments rules are fragmented across several regulators and a single rulebook would be useful to consolidate supervision and oversight,” she said.
She warned that stakeholders are “really struggling to keep up with consultations”.
| Vixio's Horizon Scanning has captured 45 consultations so far this year for the UK. |
This echoes what others in the industry have said in recent years, in many consultation papers on topics such as the future of open banking and use cases such as commercial variable recurring payments.
For now, it is unclear when the Treasury will release the National Payments Vision. One source said that they expect it to be “any day now”, which is a similar timeline to anticipated consumer credit rules for buy now, pay later (BNPL) firms.
However, conference season for the UK’s political parties, including the governing Labour Party, is around the corner, which could slow down any announcements, as could the Chancellor’s upcoming Budget.
