Bottomline unveils Confirmation of Payee tool for businesses

UK-based Bottomline has launched a Confirmation of Payee (CoP) for Business solution to help companies tackle authorised push payment (APP) fraud.

The new tool works by verifying the owner of the bank account receiving funds, enabling corporate fraud teams to “safeguard” business payments.

Instant and batch transactions are automatically verified via direct-to-source bank account checks with the CoP for Business solution, rather than via “intermittently updated” third-party bank account databases.

According to figures from UK Finance, APP fraud losses stood at £583 million in 2021, a 22% increase on 2020, and had reached £249 million in the first half of 2022.

“While the UK’s Payment Systems Regulator (PSR) has already mandated that financial institutions incorporate CoP into their consumer banking services to help prevent APP fraud, we believe more can be done,” said Colin Swain, Bottomline’s global head of platform and product transformation.

“Using our API-first technology, companies of all sizes can now better safeguard their own business payments using CoP for Business.”

Among the companies interviewed by Bottomline in its Business Payments Barometer in 2022, 29% admitted they were victims of fraud, claiming a 10% increase in fraud losses versus 2021.

Swain added: “Uniquely, CoP has over 90% bank account coverage, meaning fewer manual checks for corporate fraud teams.”

The PSR has forecast that CoP bank account coverage will extend beyond 99% by October 2023.

In the latest episode of Open Banking Expo TV, Bottomline’s Zhenya Winter and Vitus Rotzer present the main findings from the lates ‘The Future of Competitive Advantage in Banking and Payments’ report, including insights on fraud and financial crime management. Click here to watch the episode on demand and read the report in full.