The most obvious alternative, as set out in 2024’s National Payments Vision, is to bypass the card networks by moving money directly between bank accounts. The UK used to be a world leader in so-called account-to-account (A2A) payments, launching the Faster Payments System almost 20 years ago. But next week will mark a decade since regulators ordered the country’s banks to sell Vocalink, the jointly owned business that developed it. The buyer: Mastercard, which snapped it up for less than £1bn.