Dear Customer,

For my column today, I want to focus on two major regulatory changes that are shaping the future of the payments landscape.

Firstly, during the annual Mansion House speech in the City of London last month, the Bank of England (BoE) Governor Andrew Bailey announced that his organisation would be responsible for replacing the UK’s Faster Payment System (FPS).

He said there was “an urgent need for innovation in the area of payments” and that designing and delivering new UK payments infrastructure for retail payments “must be a priority”.

In practice, this means the BoE will lead the newly established Retail Payments Infrastructure Board (RPIB), tasked with overseeing the procurement process for the future system.

This direction signals a meaningful shift in UK payments. It raises important questions: What will the new infrastructure look like? How will technology enable it? And most importantly — how can we help our customers prepare?

At Form3, we welcome this renewed focus on infrastructure modernisation. It reflects a commitment from regulators to strengthen the UK’s payments foundation and enable long-term economic growth.

In my opinion, FPS has played a foundational role in enabling real-time payments in the UK and continues to serve the industry well today. That has, in turn, highlighted the fintech sector in the UK as a key engine for growth in recent decades built on the UK’s unique combination of scaled instant payments, card payments and open banking. That said, as technology and customer expectations evolve, there is a growing need for infrastructure that can both support these emerging demands and deliver resilience in an increasingly uncertain and aggressive cyber world.

I was encouraged to hear that the new system will support more advanced account-to-account capabilities, addressing limitations in today’s architectures. Modernising this infrastructure is essential to unlocking the next generation of fast, flexible payment experiences.

So as we look toward this new era of payments, what advice can we offer you?

The key takeaway is that Form3 has extensive experience in payment migrations, and our technology is already designed to seamlessly integrate with evolving payment schemes. Our API-first approach ensures clients are well-positioned to navigate regulatory change without friction.

While the RPIB has yet to deliver its first recommendations, we’re already planning for what comes next, and Form3 stands ready to support customers with resilient, flexible solutions for this next chapter in UK payments.

The second major regulatory change is the introduction of the Verification of Payee (VoP) scheme, which goes live in October. This is a significant development for payment service providers (PSPs) across Europe.

The scheme, implemented by The European Payments Council, is designed to reduce fraud and payment errors by verifying that the payee's name matches the records held by their PSP for the given IBAN.

With the deadline fast approaching, many PSPs are assessing how to meet the new requirements — and this is where Form3 can help.

My colleague Chris Mullins shares practical advice later in this newsletter on how PSPs can get VoP-ready.

Form3 has already developed a VoP solution designed to integrate seamlessly into existing infrastructure, enabling compliance while allowing PSPs to stay focused on growth and customer experience.

If you're planning your VoP strategy and need support, our team is ready to help. Get in touch to start the conversation.

As we strive ‘design, build and run the technology that powers the future of payments’ - the emerging landscape of regulatory change gives us the chance to live up to that vision and support our clients being ready, and staying ahead in a changing world.

I hope you enjoy the rest of your summer and look forward to talking again soon.