Even as the finishing touches were being put to the Faster Payment Service, though, a banking expert warned that it could lead to more fraud.

Stephen Ley at Deloitte & Touche, the professional services group, said: “The new system could lead to increased risk of fraud, as it will be harder for banks to detect and block fraud in the time available. The existing process relies, in part, on banks having sufficient time to detect suspicious transactions.”

The Faster Payment Service is said to enable electronic payments, typically made via the internet or phone, to be processed in what Apacs, the banks’ association, claims will be “hours rather than days”.

However, it is not happening all at once. The service will be rolled out gradually, so you may not see any difference at first. It will cover just 5% of all payments when it gets under way next Tuesday.

This will rise to around 50% of all internet, phone and standing-order payments by August. By the end of the year almost all internet and phone payments will be made through the system.

Not all banks will be implementing it straightaway, but customers of seven UK institutions will be able to send and receive payments from its inception, including Royal Bank of Scotland/NatWest, Barclays, HSBC and Lloyds TSB.

Lloyds TSB, the UK’s biggest current-account provider, will initially allow some telephone banking customers to send payments using the new system, but by June 6 all personal customers will be able to send money through it.

Barclays is capping the amount customers can send using the system from a limit of £5 next week to £100 by early June and allowing customers to send £10,000 by July 16.

Paul Smee, Apacs chief executive, said: “Although the initial roll-out will be gradual, and some customers may not be using the new service immediately, we expect that in the coming months this will ramp up to enable large numbers of customers to benefit from it.

“After such substantial investment by the industry, we’d like, in time, to see the new service being used for all of the UK’s internet, phone and standing-order payments.”

Apacs has produced a guide, How to use the Faster Payments Service, and an online easy-to-use sort code checker, canipayfaster.co.uk.

Customers can input any British sort code to check whether it is able to receive faster payments. More sort codes will be added over the next few months as the service is rolled out.

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