While the wave of new fintech providers has greatly increased this choice, for many cash remains the preferred or sole means to pay (17% of the UK population are unsure how they would cope, or would not cope at all in a cashless society).6 Facilitating access to cash, maintaining confidence in the currency and ensuring that people have  1  http://www.worldsfirststockexchange.com/the-worlds-first-stock-exchange.html https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/speech/2019/investing-in-ethnicity-and-race-speech-by-mark-carney.pdf https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/organization/our-insights/why-diversity-matters 4 http://media-publications.bcg.com/22feb2017-mix-that-matters.pdf 5 https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/speech/2019/a-platform-for-innovation-remarks-by-markcarney.pdf?la=en&hash=49FE92075B4C7DBB0C7E0975CDF38488BB0A02FB 6 https://www.accesstocash.org.uk/media/1087/final-report-final-web.pdf 2 3  2  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches  2  a diverse range of safe and efficient payment methods to choose from, are strategically important for the Bank. A diverse set of firms providing a diverse set of payment options is also important for financial stability and the operational resilience of the industry. This gives the public confidence when making and receiving payments. The Bank plays a role in this resilience through the safe functioning of our own payment operations such as banknote issuance and the Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) service. We also deliver this through monitoring and mitigating systemic risk across the payment industry, defending the Bank and financial sector against increasingly sophisticated cybercrime, conducting risk assessments and supervisory activity on those firms that use the Bank’s payment infrastructure, as well as supervising the systemically important payment systems themselves. And we consider the benefits and risks to financial stability from the rapidly changing fintech industry. The Bank enables diversity in payment types and providers through the policy and rules we set and the infrastructure we operate.

The new service will be materially stronger and more resilient in an increasingly complex and sophisticated environment. It will be flexible to protect against the threats we understand today and the ones we will need to adapt to in the future. RTGS Renewal will promote greater access to payment systems. We have already made policy changes to allow non-bank payment service providers direct access to payment systems and RTGS Renewal will reduce 3  All speeches are available online at www.bankofengland.co.uk/news/speeches  3  some of the barriers that we know exist today. It will speed up on-boarding times to the system and reduce the operational overheads of membership. These changes will further accelerate the number and range of firms that can gain direct access to payment systems. Since 2018 five non-bank payment service providers have opened accounts in RTGS and around twenty further firms are exploring the possibility of joining. These firms can benefit from faster transaction times and reduced individual transaction costs. Consequently, the Bank hopes to encourage a greater diversity of players in the payments market, thereby encouraging innovation and competition through development of new business models and ultimately creating a more diverse payments landscape. This will increase efficiency and reduce concentration risk thus supporting financial stability. RTGS Renewal will also promote resilience and efficiency through greater interoperability across payment systems. An important step to achieving this is the introduction of a new payment messaging standard for UK payments: ISO20022, the emerging global standard for payments messaging.