The PSR has published a summary of a conference call between key players in the payments industry to discuss the progress being made in tackling APP scams. It decided to go ahead with the call, not least as Covid-19 has provided fraudsters with more opportunity to prey on the vulnerable.
The call:
- noted the CRM Code has now been in place for 10 months, and the importance of it working effectively;
- noted that APP scams are increasing, and most of the fraud is on personal accounts;
- said the PSR is pleased at firms’ reactions to the introduction of COP – and noted the letter it sent to firms saying it would not take action against them if they failed to meet the COP deadline because of Covid-19, so long as they compensated customers who likely would not have lost money had the safeguards been in place;
- discussed why only 40% of cases assessed under the Code had been reimbursed up to the end of 2019 – when the expected figure would have been a lot higher. It is possible there is a problem with the data, but it is critical to work out what is happening, so as to improve outcomes for customers;
- discussed recent findings of the LSB and FOS, which again suggest outcomes are not where they should be;
- turned to barriers to Code participation, and how they could be removed;
- moved onto the Pay.UK decision on “no blame funding” – and how rules could and should change over time; and
- looked at the way forward, including possible action by the PSR – whose current view is that it does not have the power to require reimbursement to be made to APP scam victims. As a result, there has to be another solution, involving an industry solution or rule changes and working with Faster Payments.