Vocalink Teams With TSB To Stop Real Time Payments Fraud

TSB is teaming up with Mastercard’s Vocalink to roll out a solution to help prevent fraud and payment mix-ups, Vocalink announced in a press release on Thursday (Sept. 26).

TSB is among the initial financial institutions that will offer a Confirmation of Payee and Verify Account Name service for its customers. The solution will help people combat payment deception as well as avoid mistakes like sending funds to the wrong account.

Scammers have gotten exceptionally good at duping people into sending digital payments to erroneous bank accounts. Verifying the account name in advance will prevent misdirected funds.

“We’re leveraging our modern platform to deliver the best solutions for our customers. With over 230,000 payments made every day, we are providing the latest cutting-edge technology to help prevent TSB customers from sending money to the wrong account and to safeguard them from fraudsters,” said Suresh Viswanathan, TSB’s chief operating officer.

There were 84,624 incidents of Authorized Push Payment (APP) fraud in the U.K. in 2018 totaling £354.3 million ($437.2 million).

TSB is tapping into Vocalink’s data science capabilities to connect the account holder’s name to the sort code and account number for improved accuracy.

“By adopting our Verify Account Name solution, TSB is creating hurdles for fraudsters and in doing so, leading the way in the fight against fraud and protecting its customers,” said Gregor Dobbie, CEO at Vocalink.

This new technology builds on Vocalink’s Trace Financial Crime service, which prevents money laundering by following questionable payments along the transfer pipeline.

“Our service is highly accurate and delivers benefits to financial institutions beyond customer protection, as we know that identification and prevention are more cost-effective than dealing with errors or fraud once they’ve occurred,” Dobbie added.

Over five million TSB customers were victims of an online fraud scam last year that was triggered by an IT migration. In April, the bank said it would cover customers’ fraud losses, the first U.K. financial institution to do so. Such fraud reportedly impacted one in four U.K. consumers last year. The guarantee by TSB will cover losses from fraud, including transactions that are unauthorized or done when customers get tricked into authorizing payments to criminals.