The Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) and the Payment Systems Regulator have provided “clarity” on Open Banking pricing models in relation to the UK Payments Initiative (UKPI) and its work on commercial variable recurring payments (cVRPs).
In a statement published today (20 January), the regulators confirmed that they will not “at this stage, prioritise a Competition Act 1998 (CA98) investigation into the centralised ‘access fee’ pricing model being developed” by UKPI for cVRPs.
The FCA said: “After engaging with the funders of the UKPI, we and the PSR worked at pace to clarify our enforcement position on the UKPI’s proposal for a commercial model and consulted with the CMA about our planned non-prioritisation statement given concurrency arrangements.”
The FCA added that this statement will give UKPI “certainty” as it continues developing its cVRP product “without delay”.
The FCA and PSR wrote to the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) setting out its position on 15 January 2026 and received a response the following day, confirming that the CMA “does not intend to take a different position on CA98 prioritisation”.
In order for cVRPs to be enabled, the Account Servicing Payment Service Provider (ASPSP) must allow a payment initiation service provider (PISP) access via an API to initiate a payment on behalf of the payer, according to the FCA and PSR.
The regulators have said that the pricing arrangements around cVRPs are central to the successful launch of the scheme and its subsequent widespread adoption by billers, ASPSPs and PISPs, as well as consumers.
Under the centralised access fee model proposed by the scheme, UKPI would centrally set and mandate the price that an ASPSP would charge a PISP to initiate cVRPs for one of its customer accounts, with all UKPI scheme participants agreeing to transact on this through the multilateral agreement.
In its response to the FCA and PSR, the CMA said it “is keen to ensure that businesses are not deterred from collaborating in ways that may be beneficial to consumers or the wider economy because of uncertainty about how competition law applies”.
The decision applies until the government’s anticipated legislative framework is in place, or until July 2027, whichever comes first.
In the National Payments Vision (NPV), the UK Government set out its support for an industry-led approach to the development of a commercial model for commercial VRP Phase 1/Wave 1 use cases, which includes regulated financial services, regulated utilities, and local and central government.
Further reading: UK Finance proposes commercial model for ‘Wave 2’ cVRP
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