Press Releases

Firms agree to fund efforts to create new company to deliver the initial phase of work for commercial variable recurring payments  

02 May 2025
  • The industry has risen to the challenge that the government set at the end of 2024 calling for industry partners to play their role in supporting the effective and timely delivery of commercial variable payments (cVRPs). 
  • 31 organisations – including fintechs, high street banks, challenger banks and payment providers – have agreed to fund efforts to create an independent operator to take forward work with industry on commercial variable recurring payments. 
  • This brings to life the National Payments Vision, laid out by the Government, to see an industry-led approach to develop cVRPs. 
  • cVRPs are a pioneering new payment instruction, enabling consumers to limit the value of any payment from their account, offering a flexible alternative to Direct Debit and card-on-file payments. 
  • The proposed initial cVRP use cases (Wave 1) will enable payments in sectors including utilities, rail, government agencies, charities, and regulated financial services. 
  • Consumers and businesses now make more than 27 million open banking-powered payments monthly, and this growth continues year-on-year. 

A total of 31 organisations from across the open banking and payments industries have committed to fund initial efforts to create a new company that will carry forward work to establish cVRPs on a viable commercial footing, delivering competition, innovation and consumer choice in the payments landscape, all of which are key aims of the National Payments Vision.  

This new entity will be wholly owned and run by industry. A decision on enduring funding for the entity will be made after this initial phase of work.  

The proposed initial use cases for cVRPs will focus on selected regulated industries such as payments to utility and rail companies, regulated financial firms, e-money institutions, government bodies, and charities. cVRPs in these areas would give consumers better control over regular payments, as well as a frictionless payment experience when buying goods or services from websites.  

Open banking has already transformed the payments landscape in the past seven years, with uptake of account-to-account payments showing strong growth. In March: 

  • The total number of payments climbed to 27.21 million, year-on-year growth of 67 per cent. 
  • Of this total, 3.67 million were variable recurring payments. 
  • The total number of users reached a record high of 13.31 million. 

This is a significant moment for the industry, and I sincerely thank the organisations that have committed to fund efforts to create a company that will carry forward the important work on cVRPs. It is testament to the collaborative nature of our ecosystem that it can be industry-led. 

As a collective industry, we will continue to harness the commercial opportunities that lie before us, giving greater choice to our citizens and businesses as well as delivering wider economic growth.” 

Henk Van Hulle, OBL CEO

List of organisations funding the establishment of the MLA Operator: 

1. Acquired.com 12. MetroBank 23. Santander 
2. Barclays 13. Modulr 24. Starling 
3. Crezco 14. Moneyhub 25. Tell Money 
4. Currensea 15. Monzo 26. Token.io 
5. Ecospend  
(a Trustly company) 		16. Nationwide 27. TrueLayer 
6. Fire 17. NatWest Group 28. Vanquis (including Snoop) 
7. Fumopay 18. Neonomics/Ordo  29. Wise 
8. GoCardless 19. obconnect 30.Wonderful 
9. HSBC 20. PayPal 31. Yapily 
10. Lloyds Banking Group 21. Plaid  
11. Mastercard Open Banking Services UK 22. Revolut  

Notes to Editors 

Media contact: WA Communications

About commercial variable recurring payments

Commercial variable recurring payments (cVRPs) are the next evolution of payments. They leverage open banking technology to allow regulated firms to initiate payments over the Faster Payments network.  With cVRPs, rather than initiating a one-off payment, a customer gives their permission to make a number of payments within specific parameters (e.g. no more than £x per month).

This provides a flexible alternative to Direct Debits or stored card details.  Crucially, the parameters give customers more control about future payments and, as the payments are made over the Faster Payments network, they are almost instant. 

Wave 1 will enable payments to be made to utility companies, rail operators, financial firms, e-money providers, government bodies and charities.