Case Study: UK Power Networks eliminates APP fraud and misdirected payments with Bottomline's Confirmation of Payee

Closing the Door on Fraud with Confirmation of Payee

UK Power Networks, which maintains electricity networks across London, the South East and East of England, processes payments to more than 3,000 vendors and contractors—some worth millions—plus pensions, payroll and customer refunds. Rising authorised push payment (APP) fraud and the time-consuming manual verification process (which left payments under £10,000 largely unchecked) created a material risk of misdirected or fraudulent payments.

They deployed Bottomline’s Confirmation of Payee (CoP) for Business, a web-based check that compares sort code, account number and payee name and returns Match/Close Match/No Match in as little as 30 seconds, with auditable PDFs stored in SAP. The solution was quick to roll out and train non-finance staff on, closed the gap on lower-value payments, caught attempted fraud, and significantly reduced payment risk—giving the business faster, enterprise-wide payee verification and greater confidence in every payment.

UK Power Networks

Hardy Finn

Accounts Payable Manager