New record set for payment transactions

On 31st July over 103m payments were processed in the UK, the equivalent of 111,000 every single minute according to Bacs, the organisation that processes Direct Debits and Direct Credits.

Out of those 103m record transactions 91m were Direct Debits and 12m were Direct Credits.

Over 6.5 million transactions were processed every hour on the 31st, supressing fears that UK consumers aren’t warming towards a cashless society.

The majority of UK citizens would have been paid their monthly salary on the final day of July, a factor which could be behind the record breaking amount of transactions.

Car owners will also have contributed to the record, as the government now allows citizens to pay for their car tax via direct debit.

Bacs has found that most UK households are paying for goods and services via direct debit. Eight-out-of-ten adults in the UK have at least one direct debit and 71 per cent of household bills are paid without the use of cash.

Bacs CEO Michael Chambers said: ‘‘It is a testament to the continuing popularity of our products with consumers and businesses alike that, yet again, we are seeing processing records being broken.’’

‘‘These two new milestones come after a record 2014, in which we processed almost six billion payments, representing the highest level of growth since 2007.’’

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