Press reports that the UK is considering a Visa or Mastercard replacement is further evidence of an emerging trend in Europe, around payment independence.

Visa Inc. completed its acquisition of Visa Europe in June 21, 2016, in a deal worth around $23bn. For its part, MasterCard completed its merger with Europay International as long ago as 2002 to form a unified, global, corporation, consolidating its European operations.

A possible government-backed and City funded UK alternative to Visa/Mastercard has been mooted for years. Around 95% of UK card transactions are made using payment systems owned by Mastercard and Visa. For understandable reasons, UK regulators talk more of a backup payment platform, as opposed to taking an aggressive approach to challenging the status quo.

Industry experts offer RBI their take on the possibility of a new UK domestic payments network.

Robin Anderson, Head of Product, Tribe Payments

New reports that UK banks are accelerating plans for a domestic card payments alternative – amid concerns about over-reliance on US-owned networks – highlight a broader issue: concentration risk. The renewed focus on resilience also reflects the ambitions set out in the UK’s National Payments Vision, which has placed infrastructure modernisation firmly on the agenda.
With around 95% of UK card transactions routed through Visa and Mastercard, the system is highly efficient but also highly centralised. But card schemes are only one layer of dependency. Much of the wider financial ecosystem also relies on a very small number of global technology providers across cloud infrastructure and core digital services. Strengthening domestic infrastructure through initiatives such as DeliveryCo isn’t about replacing global partners, which remain fundamental to international commerce. It’s about reducing single points of failure across critical systems and adding optionality into the authorisation, clearing and settlement layers of UK payments.

The real test will be execution. Any new payment rail must integrate seamlessly with existing card and account-to-account ecosystems, make commercial sense for issuers and acquirers, and avoid introducing additional cost or complexity. Sovereignty in payments is less about politics and more about building redundancy that works at scale.

Jonathan Frost, Director of Global Advisory for EMEA, BioCatch

The UK is right to embrace payment card sovereignty, and to understand why, we need only look across the channel. French banks made the right decision by sticking with Carte Bancaire (CB), which provides them with a genuinely dual-rail system.

Domestic card payments are routed via CB, and international payments are routed via Visa or Mastercard. Crucially, in these uncertain times, it provides France with sovereignty over its payment card infrastructure, greater control over transaction costs, and regulatory leverage for participating banks.

In the past, the UK had limited sovereignty over its debit card infrastructure, launched in 1988, “Switch” didn’t utilise Visa or Mastercard. Ultimately, however, Switch was folded into Mastercard’s Maestro brand because there was little political focus on maintaining sovereignty, and our banking sector was content to rely on global operators.

That reliance has left the UK more exposed to geopolitical risk, while costs have risen as Visa and Mastercard have increased a range of scheme and cross-border fees in the post-Brexit landscape. The remaining question is whether the UK can realistically rebuild this alone, or whether the more viable long-term solution lies at a European level.

Breno Oliveira, Chief Product Officer at payabl.

Visa and Mastercard provide critical infrastructure to businesses and consumers on both sides of the Atlantic – underpinning commerce and cross-border trade on a global scale. 

While geopolitical tensions may have sparked questions about the dependency on these US networks for Europe’s card payments, it is important to recognise that Europe’s push for greater independence around payments pre-dates these more recent issues. 

The continent has a strong track record of building its own world-class infrastructure, including initiatives like SEPA and, more recently, Wero, a homegrown digital wallet enabling instant account-to-account payments across markets. payabl. is one of the first licensed members and a direct participant in Wero, and we have seen first-hand the appetite for innovative, locally driven solutions that complement existing systems.

New innovation and competition must always be welcomed, but the priority should remain collaboration and interoperability rather than fragmentation. Strengthening Europe’s capabilities while maintaining strong international partnerships will ensure businesses and consumers continue to benefit from greater speed, security and choice in how they pay.

A domestic card alternative is necessary but Open Banking alone isn’t enough 

Chris Jones, Managing Director at PSE Consulting

UK banks’ plans to develop a domestic alternative to the global card schemes reflect a growing recognition that payments are strategic national infrastructure, not just a commercial service.

With roughly 95% of UK card transactions dependent on Visa and Mastercard, the UK has limited room for manoeuvre if those networks were ever disrupted or constrained. History shows that payment systems can be caught up in wider geopolitical or sanctions-related decisions, which makes resilience and optionality essential.

Open Banking is often cited as the UK’s natural fallback, but it is not yet a like-for-like substitute for cards. While Open Banking payments reached close to 200 million transactions in 2024, that remains a fraction of overall card volumes, and consumer usage, trust and protection mechanisms are still maturing. Initiatives led by Open Banking Limited, alongside recent reimbursement requirements for authorised push payment fraud, are steps forward but they do not yet deliver the familiarity or ubiquity consumers associate with card payments.

There are also structural challenges on the supply side. Many Open Banking payment providers continue to struggle with profitability, reflecting low barriers to entry, intense competition and limited commercial incentives. That makes it difficult for the sector, in its current form, to act as core national payments infrastructure at scale.

Most importantly, Open Banking does not yet cover the full range of use cases cards support – from frictionless in-store payments and cross-border transactions to recurring payments and travel-related pre-authorisations. Without those capabilities, it cannot credibly replace cards in a crisis scenario.

This is why the move towards a dedicated domestic payments rail, supported by banks and overseen with the involvement of the Bank of England, is so significant. But success will depend on whether the UK can align incentives, liability frameworks and technology in a way that builds consumer trust and merchant acceptance.

Payments sovereignty will not be achieved through a single solution. It will require coordinated public–private investment, closer interoperability with European schemes, and a clear recognition that payments resilience sits alongside energy, food and data as a matter of national security.