The Cambridge joins Pay.UK’s Confirmation of Payee service

September 13, 2022

The Cambridge Building Society has become one of the first building societies to join Pay.UK’s Confirmation of Payee (CoP) service.

CoP is a name-checking service that helps banks and building societies protect their customers against fraud and accidentally misdirected payments by checking the name of the recipient account.

The Cambridge has implemented CoP after the service was augmented earlier this year to support participant accounts that rely on sort code and account information plus additional data, such as a building society account number.

The Cambridge awarded the implementation of the service to Bottomline, who won its competitive tender. Bottomline’s solution recently received honours from Aite-Novarica for best digital identity verification innovation.

Nick Warner, Programme Manager at The Cambridge, said: “Once the CoP service enabled SRD to be checked, we knew it was something we should be a part of.

“At our core, we offer a safe place for savings and help people buy their homes. A payment is a key part of both of those experiences, so being part of CoP is a natural fit for what we offer to our members. Working with Bottomline enabled us to draw on external expertise in completing this work.”

Paul Fannon, Chief Revenue Officer at Bottomline, said: “As APP fraud continues to rise, it’s promising to see building societies like The Cambridge leading the adoption of technology to protect customers against fraud and scams.

“Equally welcoming is the news that the PSR is mandating CoP implementation for more than 400 payment solution providers, including all building societies by June 2024 – a clear indication of the industry’s intention to keep fraud at bay.”