Future of Payments Part 2 - Ashfords LLP & FinTech West
FinTech West’s latest event was our second ‘Future of Payments’ seminar in partnership with Ashfords, following a popular first event in February.
Julian Wells, Director of Whitecap Consulting & FinTech West, kicked off the event with a brief overview of FinTech West’s activities across the South West over the last 6 years, and explained how the region connects into the national ecosystem and other regions via the FinTech National Network and other initiatives such as Future Finance.
Oliver Woodhouse, Senior Associate, Financial Regulatory at Ashfords gave a regulatory update of the recent developments relevant to the payments sector. The FCA Annual Report 2024 focused on multi-sector areas including authorisation efficiencies, consumer protection, and enforcement. In payments specifically, consumer protection is especially prominent and there is an increased focus on the role of international firms operating in the UK. Fraud and financial crime in payments are a major industry issue and APP fraud reimbursement requirements are due to change later this year, which is placing a lot of pressure on payments providers and banks alike. Another major issue across financial services and credit payments is operational resilience,
Christian Shanahan, Founder & CEO of Payji, told the audience how his firm is solving the problem of reducing transaction fees using a scalable ‘people powered’ payments platform. The platform is launching locally as Bristol Pay, which enables payments to be made at lower cost, while keeping the transaction fees in the local community where a retailer operates. Christian said that Payji “is about interactions, not transactions”, and explained how his vision is to provide a broader ecosystem based on the same values, to help retailers and consumers alike, while supporting the local economy.
Renuka Rawlins, was our next speaker, Government Affairs & Policy Manager at FinTech giant Revolut. The firm was founded in 2015 and now has its banking licence, which is a catalyst for its future growth. Renuka spoke about the new government and the need to align payments and FinTech and payments to the government’s policy focus, including economic recovery, innovation and digital transformation, and financial stability (including cybersecurity). Renuka noted that the recent progress with the Digital Information & Smart Data Bill is a very encouraging development, which links strongly to the evolution of Open Banking and Open Finance. Renuka also spoke about the APP fraud reimbursement requirements that are due to change later this year.
James Jackson (JJ), SVP of Customer Experience at APEXX Global, spoke about ‘payments orchestration’, a term which refers to the process of managing and streamlining various payment methods via a single platform. JJ highlighted the complexity of the payments ecosystem, spanning merchants, acquirers, payment gateways and many others. Payments orchestration is increasingly common across the payments industry, with unified APIs across ecosystem players. Apexx’s proposition generates value from payment orchestration by increasing revenue and margin, while reducing operational overheads by approximately 12%.
All the presentations generated a lot of questions, ensuring the event was both highly engaging and very informative. Many thanks to all who attended, to all the speakers and to Ashfords for supporting this series.
Coming soon we have the FinTech West annual conference, taking place on Wednesday 9th October. There are only limited places left, with nearly 180 people already registered. Click here to join us.