UK payments professionals largely endorse the government’s plan to modernise the country’s retail payment rails, yet few feel fully assured that the program will be delivered as intended.
That is the central message of From Vision to Delivery, a survey of 350 industry figures published by technology firm CI&T on 10 September 2026.
Eighty-two per cent of respondents support the National Payments Vision, first set out by HM Treasury in November 2024.
The policy aims to refresh the systems that sit behind everyday transfers, promising more competition, tighter security and wider choice for households and firms.
Only 29 per cent, however, say they are very confident the plan will work in practice.
Among people in executive and strategy roles the figure rises sharply to 95 per cent, suggesting seniority and proximity to programme design shape how risk is judged.
Almost the entire sample — 349 of 350 — anticipates communication problems.
The most cited worry is the delivery timetable and its milestones (33 per cent).
Close behind, at 30 per cent each, are how the work will sit alongside other regulation and what testing, migration and readiness will require of participants.
The findings land as the Bank of England-chaired Retail Payments Infrastructure Board closes a consultation on the design of next-generation infrastructure (responses due 11 September 2026).
That exercise focuses on what should be built; CI&T asked how leaders expect it to be delivered.
A clear preference emerges for evolution rather than a clean-slate rebuild.
Eighty-five per cent say modernisation must work with systems already in use, a view held by 98 per cent of senior executives.
No single technical path dominates: replacing selected components leads at 30 per cent, with parallel running, updated data standards, new assurance processes and targeted integration clustered within a couple of points.
Proper testing before go-live is the most popular continuity measure, backed by 82 per cent.Governance is another split.
Every executive and strategic leader surveyed rates clear decision-making and escalation routes as important.
Only 59 per cent of product and innovation specialists — the people who will build on the new rails — say the same.
The gap hints at two programmes running in parallel: one about ownership and accountability, the other about product and technical delivery.International comparison also features.
Ninety-seven per cent believe the UK can learn from Brazil’s Pix instant-payment system, which now reaches about 93 per cent of Brazilian adults.
Respondents point especially to how participants were brought in and how implementation snags were handled.
A third of senior leaders also want clarity on which Pix lessons should not be imported.Young Pham, CI&T’s global head of financial services AI, argues the country has moved from stating intent to executing it.
Early choices on milestones, roles, readiness rules and the path from today’s stack to the target system will, he says, determine whether confidence hardens into delivery.
The report lists five decisions it says must be settled soon: a usable roadmap; selective replacement and parallel running; governance agreed before problems scale; inclusion designed in from policy through to post-launch checks; and a blend of large-programme experience, overseas learning and UK market knowledge.
The Vision sits inside a longer public-private sequence: a 2025 delivery model creating the Retail Payments Infrastructure Board and an industry-led Delivery Company, a November 2025 infrastructure strategy, a 2026–28 regulatory forward plan, and ongoing work on roles across the ecosystem. Censuswide conducted the fieldwork between 17 and 25 June 2026 among banks, fintechs, corporates and public bodies.