Simulating Account Holder Verification

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This page describes the behaviour of version 2 of the endpoint. For the article for version 1, see Simulating Account Holder Verification (v1).

The sandbox environment supports Account Holder Verification (AHV) workflows, allowing you to test your integration before going live, including different match levels, name variations, and fallback conditions, all without involving any real accounts or providers.

The simulator supports:

• Confirmation of Payee (CoP - UK): for GBP payments via Faster Payments
• Verification of Payee (VoP - EU): for EUR payments via SEPA (SEPA Credit Tranfer, SEPA Instant, SEPA Direct Debit)
• Confirmation of Payee (CoP - AU): for AUD payments via the Australian scheme (BSB + Account Number)

Test scenarios in the sandbox

In the sandbox, you can simulate and test how your integration handles:

1. Exact name matches
2. Close matches (e.g. spelling differences or mismatched account types)
3. No matches (e.g. incorrect names, invalid accounts, opt-outs)
4. Fallback behavior for unknown (non-predefined) inputs
5. Error responses (e.g. technical error)

All responses follow the same API format as in production — enabling accurate and efficient testing.

How the verification type is determined from the payload

There is no explicit field in the request to select CoP UK, VoP EU or CoP AU. Instead, the verification type is automatically inferred from the contents of the request:

Important notes:

• IBANs will always be checked using the VoP service, even if they are GB IBANs
• To trigger a request via CoP UK, you must specify both an account number and sort code
• Invalid or mixed combinations will result in a validation error

How to Simulate Specific Match Scenarios

To trigger a specific match result, submit one of the predefined input combinations as listed below. The sandbox will respond with the corresponding matchLevel, reasonCode, description and detailedDescription.

Predefined CoP - UK Test Cases

Predefined VoP - EU Test Cases

Use the following IBAN-based inputs to simulate VoP responses.

Predefined CoP - AU Test Cases

Note on AU response accountHolder names:

• **Match / Close match (Personal & Business) **→ returns accountHolder as one string.
  • Single holder: "Michael Thomas"
  • Joint account (High match score name + and others): "John Smith and others"
  • Multiple high match score names (comma-separated + and others): "John Smith, John Smith1 and others"
• No match (Personal) → no accountHolder name returned.
• No match (Business) → returns **accountHolder **name

ReasonCode:

• Match / Close match / No match → empty/null.
• Error → scheme external/scheme internal codes (e.g., COP.API.9011, COP.API.9021)

Catch-All Fallback for Unknown Inputs (all schemes)

If your input does not match any predefined sandbox test case, the system returns a default "No Match" response — allowing you to test how your application handles unrecognized or unknown accounts.

Notes

• The sandbox is stateless and returns predefined responses only
• No real data is accessed or verified
• CoP UK, VoP EU, and CoP AU are supported on the same AHV endpoint; selection is based on input fields (see table above).