UK Finance is set to work on a new UK regulated liability network (RLN) experimentation phase with 11 of its members.

The RLN is seen as a "platform for innovation" across multiple forms of money, including existing commercial bank deposits and a shared ledger for tokenised commercial bank deposits.

Through a collaboration of several stakeholders within the financial services industry, the UK RLN explores the options for users to make payments, transact and settle liabilities in the digital marketplaces of the future.

Some of the potential benefits to customers, businesses and the wider UK economy include giving users more options to manage their payments, enhanced fraud mitigations and improved settlement capabilities.

The experimentation phase, which will run until summer 2024, will focus on payment-upon-delivery for a physical product, aimed at reducing fraud in online marketplaces; the process of buying a home, improving customer transparency, and mitigating conveyancing fraud; and a digital bond settlement, to connect digital customer money to digital assets.

Managing director at UK Finance, Jana Mackintosh, said: "We are delighted to bring together several of our members to explore an inclusive design for all digital money. It is important that the UK financial community works in close collaboration with public sector stakeholders to explore our common objective – to equip the UK with world leading financial infrastructure. Our work is designed to inform the best way forward for all forms of regulated digital money."

Firms currently involved in the network are Barclays, Citi, HSBC, Lloyds Banking Group, Mastercard, NatWest, Nationwide, Santander, Standard Chartered, Virgin Money and Visa.

The firms are being supported by EY and Linklaters, alongside a technology team of R3, Quant DXC and Coadjute.

Managing director for advanced technologies at the chief technology office for Barclays, Lee Braine, added: "It is great to see the financial services industry collaborating to push the envelope of payments innovation. We hope these experiments will provide insights into how a common platform for innovation could enhance customer experiences with new payments functionality and also mitigate the risk of fragmentation in retail payment markets."

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