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The new strategy challenges card networks’ dominance and plans for multi-money interoperability, but its success will depend on whether payment service providers (PSPs) can adapt their business models through a multi-year transformation.
In November 2024, the UK government published its National Payments Vision, establishing the Payments Vision Delivery Committee (PVDC) to chart a course for the country's payments future.
The , released in early November 2025, represents the PVDC's response: a framework built around five strategic outcomes that extend beyond a mere technological upgrade to reimagine how money moves through the British economy.
The PVDC comprises the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), the Payment Systems Regulator (PSR), the Bank of England and HM Treasury.
The committee has developed a strategy based on three foundational pillars: innovation; competition; and security. At its heart lies a commitment to account-to-account (A2A) functionality at the point of sale, moving beyond the card-dominated present towards a more diverse payments landscape.
The strategy articulates five interconnected outcomes:
- First, it envisions greater choice of innovative, cost-effective payment options for consumers and businesses, while maintaining essential services such as cheque processing for financial inclusion.
- Second, it foresees the emergence of a “multi-money ecosystem” where stablecoins, tokenised deposits and traditional digital money interoperate seamlessly.
- Third, it prioritises fraud prevention through collaborative efforts, high-quality data and AI-driven analytics.
- Fourth, it demands fair, transparent access to infrastructure for all participants to maximise competition.
- Finally, it requires end-to-end operational resilience, supporting around-the-clock transactions.
Pay.UK, the operator of existing retail interbank payment systems, will continue to oversee the current infrastructure as the ecosystem prepares for transformation.
Rethinking the UK’s payments infrastructure
This strategy represents more than an incremental improvement: it signals a fundamental rethinking of payments infrastructure as a catalyst for ecosystem-wide innovation rather than a passive utility.
By explicitly rejecting a “like-for-like upgrade” of Faster Payments and Bacs, the PVDC acknowledges that the payments landscape has evolved beyond what legacy systems were designed to support.
The emphasis on A2A payments at the point of sale directly challenges the entrenched position of card networks, whose interchange fees, processing costs and market dominance have long been seen as a challenge.
If successfully implemented, this shift could redistribute value within the payments chain, potentially reducing costs for merchants while creating new competitive dynamics.
For PSPs, this represents both threat and opportunity. Although existing business models built around card processing may face margin compression, new models centred on real-time account transfers could emerge.
The commitment to a multi-money ecosystem is equally significant. By planning for interoperability between traditional bank deposits, stablecoins and tokenised deposits from the outset, the strategy aims to avoid fragmentation.
This could position the UK as a jurisdiction where digital asset innovation occurs within, rather than alongside, mainstream payments infrastructure.
Perhaps more significantly, the strategy recognises that resilient infrastructure is not merely a technical requirement, but a prerequisite for trust.
In an era where payments increasingly underpin real-time commerce and where system failures cascade rapidly through interconnected services, this focus on operational resilience reflects hard-learned lessons from incidents across global payments systems.
A multi-year project
The pathway from strategy to implementation requires careful navigation. The plan’s multi-year development timeline, although realistic, introduces execution risk given the pace at which the payments landscape is evolving.
The formation of an industry-owned Delivery Company to implement, procure and fund next-generation infrastructure distributes both the investment burden and decision-making authority across ecosystem participants.
This structure could either accelerate progress through aligned incentives or slow it through diffused accountability.
PSPs should be focused on engagement rather than just observation. The PVDC’s forthcoming Payments Forward Plan, due by the end of 2025, will outline initiatives across retail and wholesale payments and digital assets. Organisations should examine this plan critically, engaging with regulators to clarify ambiguities and challenge timeline assumptions.
Business model adaptation may also become essential. Providers whose approaches depend heavily on card transaction fees should model scenarios where A2A payments capture significant point-of-sale volume.
Conversely, those positioned in account infrastructure, authentication services or fraud prevention may find expanded opportunities as the ecosystem pivots toward their capabilities.
The strategy’s emphasis on interchangeability suggests that competitive advantage will increasingly accrue to platforms that can seamlessly bridge payment methods rather than those optimised for single rails.
The committee’s undertaking to monitor international developments signals an openness to learning from other jurisdictions’ approaches. However, it also implies that the strategy itself may evolve as global best practices emerge, requiring participants to be adaptable.
Ultimately, this strategy’s success will hinge on whether the coordinated approach between government, regulators and industry can maintain momentum through the inevitable challenges of large-scale infrastructure transformation.
The outcomes are ambitious, the timeline extended and the stakes high. For an economy increasingly dependent on frictionless digital payments, getting this right matters profoundly – not just for the payments sector, but for the UK's broader competitiveness in an increasingly digital global economy.
