Paid Money to the Wrong Person by Mistake

A misdirected payment is money sent to the wrong bank account. The first thing to know is how little time you have: money sent by Faster Payments through online or app banking reaches the recipient's account within 2 hours, and sometimes immediately¹. Transfers through banking apps usually arrive within seconds, and in most cases funds arrive in the recipient's bank account within seconds, though they may occasionally take up to 2 hours².

That speed is why the recovery process is different from a card problem. There is no routine way to pull a completed Faster Payment back. If the account you sent money to does not exist, the payment should fail and the money should automatically bounce back to you². If the account does exist, you will need to contact your bank to request your money back², and whether it comes back depends on the person who received it agreeing to return it.

Before any of that happens, your bank should have shown you a name check. Confirmation of Payee is the name checking service designed to help prevent APP scams and misdirected payments⁴, and it has been part of UK payments since 2020². It warns you when a name does not match. It does not stop the payment.

Faster Payments arrive in minutes, so act straight away

The window to fix a mistake is measured in minutes, not days. Money sent using Faster Payments through online banking on a smartphone app will reach the recipient's account within 2 hours, and sometimes it is received immediately¹. One bank describes the same process as near-immediate, with funds arriving within seconds in most cases and occasionally taking up to 2 hours³.

This matters because the majority of authorised push payment fraud is enacted with a Faster Payment⁷, and 98% of this fraud takes place over the Faster Payments System, the UK's real-time payments system that allows for near-instant transfers⁸. The same rails that make a legitimate payment convenient make a mistaken one hard to retrieve.

The practical sequence is short. Contact your bank to request your money back². If the account does not exist, the payment should fail and the money should automatically bounce back to you². If it does exist, your bank can ask the receiving bank to contact its customer, but it cannot force the money out of an account that was correctly identified by the details you gave.

Confirmation of Payee: the name check before you pay

Confirmation of Payee works by checking whether the name of the account that a payer is sending money to matches the name they have entered, with alerts notifying the payer when there has not been a match⁹. Banks use the service to check if the name and account type, such as personal or business, that you enter when setting up a new payee matches the details registered with the bank receiving the money².

It is a large-scale system. There are now more than one million Confirmation of Payee requests every day¹⁰. The service was built in stages: payment service providers had to be capable of receiving and responding to Confirmation of Payee requests from other payment service providers by 1 April 2019, and of sending requests and presenting responses to their customers by 1 July 2019¹¹. Since then, a number of non-directed providers have voluntarily joined, so that there are now a total of 33 providers offering the service¹².

The check is designed to catch the moment before a mistake becomes permanent. If the details do not match up, a warning is provided before you make the payment². What it cannot do is verify that the person you think you are paying is who you believe them to be: it confirms a name against an account, not an intention.

Match, close match or no match: what each result means

Alerts notify the payer whether there has been a match, a close match, or no match, meaning corrections can be made before the payment is sent⁴. Some banks describe four outcomes rather than three: a match, no match, a close match, and unable to check the account¹³. Another lists four matching scenarios as match, close match, no match and account not found¹⁴.

A close match is the result people most often misread. The details you entered closely match those confirmed by the receiving bank, and this happens if either the name you have given is slightly different from the name on the account, or if the account type is incorrect¹⁸. A middle initial, a maiden name, a trading name instead of a registered one, or a personal account chosen when the payee holds a business account will all produce a close match rather than a clean one.

A no match is the result that should stop you. If you make a payment using the wrong details, it may not reach the correct account and the bank may not be able to recover the money¹⁹.

Where Confirmation of Payee does not apply

The service covers accounts which allow consumers to transfer funds in and out, such as current accounts and e-money accounts; mortgage and credit card accounts are excluded²⁰. BACS payments, including direct debits, are not included²¹.

There are also gaps on the receiving side. If you try to set up a new payment to an account with a bank that does not use Confirmation of Payee, your bank will let you know that it cannot check the account name, and you can then decide whether to go ahead with the payment or not¹⁷. If you try to pay an individual or business who banks with a provider that does not support Confirmation of Payee, it will not be possible for your bank to check that the account details are correct²².

Three specific situations produce a name that cannot be identified: the person you are trying to pay has only opened the account within the last 48 hours; the recipient's building society or bank does not use Confirmation of Payee; or the person may have chosen to opt out of Confirmation of Payee²³. You are automatically opted in to Confirmation of Payee to help protect you from fraud and to prevent payments going to the wrong account²⁴. If you do opt out, you can still use the service when sending payments, but your own account will not be checked when others pay you, and payers will get a message that your details cannot be checked¹⁹. If you opt out and then change your mind, you can call your bank to opt back in²⁵.

Mistaken payment or scam: which protections cover you

These are two different problems with two different routes, and mixing them up costs people money.

A misdirected payment is a mistake: you sent money to the wrong bank account². The route is your bank, a request for return, and the cooperation of the recipient. There is no statutory refund for a payment you authorised and sent to a real account using details you chose.

An authorised push payment scam is different. You were tricked into authorising the payment. The reimbursement rules cover transfers where you made a transfer as part of a scam on or after 7 October 2024, made the transfer to another UK account, and told the bank or payment service provider no more than 13 months after the last payment⁵. The rules apply to payments made within the UK, and you are not covered for a payment sent overseas²⁶. Payments sent to or from accounts outside the UK are not covered⁶.

If you are worried you have given your payment details or money to a scammer, contact your bank or payment provider as soon as possible and explain what has happened²⁷. Where a bank has frozen an account or blocked a payment, the Financial Ombudsman Service sees complaints about unusual or suspicious activity on the current account, or doubts about whether the customer had authorised a payment or other activity²⁸.

What name to enter, and how to check before you send

For an individual, ask for their first or main name and their last name. For a business, use the business name or trading name registered to their account²⁹. Entering the name you know a company by, rather than the name on its account, is a common cause of a close match.

Some payments deserve a second check regardless of what the screen says. Confirm payment details, or changes to payment details, in person or over the phone on a trusted number³¹. This matters most where a large sum is moving and the instructions arrive by email, which is the pattern behind conveyancing scams.

If you are paying a business and something looks wrong, deal with the business directly. The DVLA, for example, asks people to return a refund cheque if it is in the wrong name and tell them the right name³². The same principle applies to any organisation: correct the record with them rather than sending money to a name that does not match.

If the money has gone: what to do, in order

1. Contact your bank immediately and ask it to request the money back².
2. If the account does not exist, expect the payment to fail and bounce back automatically².
3. If the account exists, your bank will approach the receiving bank, which will contact its customer.
4. If you were tricked rather than mistaken, say so clearly: the reimbursement rules cover transfers made as part of a scam on or after 7 October 2024, to another UK account, reported within 13 months⁵.
5. If the bank's response is unsatisfactory, take the complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service²⁸.

Keep the evidence: the payment confirmation, the messages or emails that led to the payment, and the dates. The 13-month reporting window runs from the last payment, not the first⁵.

Where the protection stops

Confirmation of Payee is a warning system, not a guarantee. It cannot check an account at a bank that does not use the service²², it cannot check an account opened within the last 48 hours²³, and it cannot check an account whose holder has opted out²³. It also does not cover BACS payments or direct debits²¹.

The reimbursement rules have their own edges. They apply to UK bank transfers, so an international payment is outside them³³, and payments sent to or from accounts outside the UK are not covered⁶. They cover payments made as part of a scam, not a payment you simply sent to the wrong sort code by accident.

For a genuine mistake, the outcome rests on the recipient. If they agree to return the money, the bank can arrange it. If they do not, the money is in their account and the dispute is between you and them, not between you and your bank.

If you are struggling with the consequences of a payment that has gone wrong, free and impartial help is available from MoneyHelper and from debt advice charities. If your complaint is about how your bank handled the payment, the Financial Ombudsman Service is free to use²⁸.