What is Confirmation of Payee (CoP)?
Confirmation of Payee is a name-checking service. It allows people and businesses paying to a recipient in the UK to check whether the name they have entered matches the one on the recipient’s account.
It helps make sure that people are sending money to the correct account. It’s part of a greater effort by UK institutions and the finance industry to tackle scams and fraud.
Confirmation of Payee currently only supports payments to UK local account details (Sort Code and Account Number) via CHAPS, Faster Payments or a Standing Order upon set up. Unfortunately, it doesn’t support BACS and Direct Debits.
How it works
When you set up a new recipient, the receiving bank checks the name on their bank account. You will be shown one of these outcomes:
Full match: The name completely matches with the name on the Wise account
Partial match: The name partially matches, but it’s a close match — for example you entered Mick Jager instead of Mick Jagger
No match: The name doesn’t match with the name on the recipient account.
Confirmation of Payee Unavailable: The name can’t be checked — for example, if an account doesn't exist or the receiving bank doesn’t participate in Confirmation of Payee
What you should know
When you are setting up a new UK recipient, we’ll tell you if the name you entered matches the one listed for the account details. We will also let you know if we haven’t been able to check the name.
In both cases, you should double check whether you are sending money to the correct person or business before completing the payment.
If you decide to continue without receiving confirmation of the name being correct, we may not be able to recover your money if it ends up in the wrong account.
Future plans for CoP
We’re also working to support checking the names of recipients you set up on your Wise account. In the coming months, when you set up a new GBP recipient, we’ll let you know whether the name you entered matches the one on the receiving bank account.
How to opt out of CoP
If you’d like to opt your Wise account out of Confirmation of Payee, send an email to confirmationofpayee@wise.com explaining why.
We aim to review your request within 7 days. If we deny your request, we’ll let you know why. You can appeal a rejection by writing to the same email.
How to make a complaint
If you’d like to issue a complaint to Wise about a transaction involving CoP — contact our support team.