The report, A focus on Enhanced Data with payments, follows on from publication of Payments UK’s ground breaking World Class Payments in the UK report last August, which set out an evidence-based vision of what the payments of tomorrow might look like if built on collective customer needs.

Currently the amount of information that can be sent with payments is limited to a small number of characters. This can make reconciling payments laborious, particularly for businesses and government who are reliant upon remittance information which often has to be sent separately and manually matched with an incoming payment. Delivering Enhanced Data would transform all types of customers’ payment experience as it would enable more information to be linked to a payment.

Enhanced Data is one of four priority capabilities* identified by Payments UK that consumers, businesses, charities, the public sector and the industry need if payments in the UK are to remain world class. A focus on Enhanced Data with payments is the first of four short reports covering the World Class Payments priority areas which will be published over the coming weeks.

The Enhanced Data report highlights:

• A number of challenges to be addressed for Enhanced Data to be delivered in the UK, such as establishing a realistic timescale for delivery.
• The delivery of common payment standards and standard APIs would support the delivery of Enhanced Data.
• The delivery of Enhanced Data can be achieved without pushing more data through payment systems. Linking payment reference data to additional information could enable it to be stored in a secure separate location (e.g. via ‘cloud’ storage) and made available to the payee and payer throughout the payment journey.
• A worldwide assessment reveals a lack of demand from users for the ability to send unlimited data – even in countries where it is currently possible to do so.
• The World Class Payments priority capabilities are interlinked - their combined delivery would maximise opportunities for innovation and competition to benefit UK customers.

Tim Yudin, Payments UK’s Director of Design and Delivery, said:

“We have spent the last two years listening to what customers and users of payments ideally would like from their payment experience. One of these is to get more information with their payments – known as Enhanced Data. Our evidence shows that this innovation would yield significant benefits to all customers but particularly for businesses and government who need to reconcile payments.

“The aim of our report is to provide more detail about why and how Enhanced Data could make a difference and considerations to help its delivery. The new payments regulator is currently working with the industry to shape a strategy for the future and we hope today’s report will help inform their thinking.”

The aim of the World Class Payments work is to support the industry and its regulators in their efforts to take informed decisions when setting strategy. World Class Payments aims to support competition and innovation by identifying a steady stream of potential new benefits that are important to customers.

The World Class Payments project has analysed evidence within the context of the fast-moving payments environment, to identify thirteen capabilities that build on the world class benefits customers already enjoy. The analysis considered customer needs, technological, regulatory and market developments and improvements already in the pipeline as well as comparing the UK to other leading countries.