Setting up this channel for our PayBridge EU integration — our first European customer! Lukas Weber is their Head of Product, we'll be working closely with his team. Pilot kicks off tomorrow. Really excited about this one — Netherlands-based, SEPA Credit Transfer rail, and a great opportunity to show what Acme can do in the European market.
Quick context for everyone: PayBridge is a Netherlands payment institution, operating on the SEPA Credit Transfer rail for EUR payments. Pilot target is £2M/month, with a ramp to £10–15M/month by Q3 if all goes well. Lukas is really pleased with the partnership so far.
Exciting — first EU customer! What are the pilot success criteria we're tracking against?
Main ones: sub-1% failure rate, settlement working smoothly end-to-end, no major compliance blockers. We aligned on those with Lukas's team before kick-off.
I'll get sandbox access set up for their team tomorrow. Do we have their API integration contact on their side? Need someone to issue credentials to.
Yes — their tech lead is coordinating. I'll forward you their details now.
Sandbox provisioned and credentials issued. Basic SEPA credit transfer flow is working. One question before we go further — their BIC/SWIFT codes include some non-standard formats. Do we validate against the ISO 9362 registry or just format-check?
format check only right now. registry lookup would need a third-party service. can do a proper fix but not in a day
OK — flagging it as a known gap. Format check is probably fine for pilot scale but let's track it.
Tom — can you get a proper BIC validation fix in this week? Want to go into the first live tests clean.
yeah i can do that. tomorrow EOD.
Hi all — just joining this channel. Sorry for the late intro, been pulled across a few things. Quick question: has KYC for PayBridge been completed? I don't have a record on my side.
Yes — Onfido verification went through last week. I can forward you the confirmation if useful.
That would be great, thanks. Also — has the PSD2 cross-border review with Herbert Smith been kicked off? That's a prerequisite for live EU payments.
Yes, sent the brief two weeks ago. Should be fairly straightforward given the pilot scope — Netherlands is a well-regulated market.
Lena — what's the timeline looking like for first end-to-end test? Lukas is asking.
Sandbox is working for basic SEPA credits. I'd say end of this week for full test readiness — want to cover error paths and edge cases too, not just happy path.
bic validation fix pushed. lena can you confirm?
Confirmed — passing on all test cases including the edge cases I had flagged. Nice one.
End-to-end test with PayBridge sandbox complete. All basic SEPA credit transfers working. Some of the Dutch IBANs are behaving oddly — Rabobank and Triodos formats specifically. Getting a validation failure on about 15% of NL accounts. Investigating — should have a fix by Monday.
Is this a blocker for going live?
Yes — if Rabobank is one of their primary banks (likely given it's NL) this would cause material failures. But it's fixable. Monday.
Daniel — Lukas's team has sent over a feature wish list for post-pilot. Three things: SEPA Instant, batch payment submission, and webhook filtering by payment type. Noting here for the roadmap conversation.
SEPA Instant is on the roadmap for H2 — I've told Lukas that. Batch and webhook filtering are good calls, I'll add them to the backlog. Don't commit to specific dates on any of these yet.
Understood. Will manage expectations.
Two follow-ups to Herbert Smith this week, no response. Going to call them Monday morning. Sorry for the delay on this — I know it's on the critical path.
IBAN validation fix deployed. All Rabobank and Triodos NL formats now passing — tested against 200 sample IBANs. We're clean.
Great progress this week. Lena — are we ready on our side for first live transactions? Lukas wants to target next week.
Technically yes. Sandbox testing is clean, IBAN fix is in, BIC validation solid. Happy to proceed when we have the go-ahead.
Technically ready for live. All sandbox testing clean. Happy to proceed when given the go-ahead.
Brilliant. @alex-reed can you put together the go-live checklist? Want to make sure we're not missing anything procedural.
Go-live checklist drafted: 1. Production credentials provisioned ✅ (Lena) 2. Monitoring and alerts configured 3. PayBridge team briefed on error handling / escalation path 4. KYC sign-off ✅ 5. Compliance sign-off (PSD2 assessment complete) 6. Settlement process confirmed with processor 7. Recon process tested 8. Rollback plan documented Anything missing?
Still haven't heard back from Herbert Smith on PSD2. Compliance sign-off is on the list... do we have it? I genuinely don't know the current status.
We discussed this when we kicked off the pilot. The agreement was to proceed at pilot scale while the formal review runs in parallel. Rachel's aware.
I just can't find where that was documented. Do you have a link to the decision log entry or email thread?
It was a verbal discussion, Sam. I'll follow up with Rachel directly if needed. Let's not hold up the go-live for this — it's a £2M pilot, not a full production launch. Very different risk profile.
Production credentials provisioned. Monitoring configured — will alert on failure rate >0.5% and on settlement lag. Rollback plan is to suspend the routing rule and revert to sandbox. Can deploy in under 10 mins if needed.
Daniel tagged me in — hi everyone. What's the settlement setup for EUR? Are we going through Modulr for this?
No — third-party SEPA processor, not Modulr. T+1 settlement.
T+1? Our product page says same-day settlement.
That's GBP Tier 1 (Faster Payments). SEPA Credit Transfer is a different rail — T+1 is standard. SEPA Instant would be same-day but that's not live yet.
OK got it. Does PayBridge know that? Don't want a surprise on their end.
Yes — Lukas is fine with T+1 for the pilot. We were explicit about that in scoping.
First live EUR payment through Acme 🎉 Small amount — €500 test transaction — but it processed cleanly end to end. Well done everyone, big milestone.
Great work Lena especially — sandbox to live in under 3 weeks is fast. What's the plan for volume ramp?
Slow and steady this week — a few hundred transactions to prove the pipeline. Then ramp through April. Lukas is very happy.
Settlement discrepancy flagged — processor's settlement file shows 47 transactions but our ledger has 49. Investigating now.
Could be a timing issue. Can you share the timestamps on the two extras?
Both at 14:12 and 14:17 CET.
That's it — SEPA cut-off is 14:00 CET. Those two hit after cut-off so the processor rolled them into the next day's settlement batch. Our ledger books them same-day. Mismatch is expected behaviour, just not handled.
Our recon process doesn't account for the SEPA 14:00 CET cut-off at all. Adjusting the recon logic to treat post-cut-off transactions as next-day. Will take a day.
Is this visible to PayBridge?
No — it's on our side only. But if we don't fix it we'll get false discrepancy flags every single day.
Spoke to Lukas — he's asking about settlement timing. He expected same-day. I explained T+1 is the pilot setup and that SEPA Instant is on roadmap for H2. He's ok for now but flagging he'll ask again.
SEPA Instant depends on Atlas completing and API v2 — both are behind schedule. I wouldn't promise anything specific on H2.
I told him H2. Let's keep that position for now and revisit if Atlas slips further.
Herbert Smith finally came back after three chasers. They need more detail on our data flows for EU subjects. They've sent a questionnaire — 22 questions, mostly around data residency, transfer mechanisms, and our sanctions screening process. Working through it.
Good progress Sam. What's the turnaround — can we get it back to them this week?
Unlikely this week — some of the data residency questions I need to verify with Lena and potentially legal. More realistically early next week. Sorry.
Hi all — I've added myself to this channel. Sam, can I get a status update on the PSD2 compliance review? I've been asked about our EU compliance posture in leadership weekly and want to make sure I have the full picture.
Hi Rachel — Herbert Smith sent a questionnaire on data flows last week. I'm halfway through it, hoping to send back by end of this week. The assessment itself will take a few weeks after that.
Thanks Sam. And to clarify the wider picture — my understanding is that this pilot went live before the PSD2 assessment was complete. Is that correct?
Rachel — we aligned on proceeding at pilot scale while the review runs in parallel. Sarah was aware when we made that call.
I don't have any record of agreeing to that. I'm not saying it didn't happen, but I can't find it in the Decision Log, meeting notes, or any email thread I'm on. Can you point me to where it was documented?
I believe it was discussed verbally when we were scoping the pilot. I should have documented it better — that's on me. But the key point is we're at pilot scale, £2M/month, and the risk profile is very different from a full production launch.
I appreciate the honesty on documentation. But I want to be clear: processing EUR payments cross-border without a completed PSD2 assessment is a compliance risk regardless of volume. I'm not asking you to shut down the pilot, but I need this formally acknowledged and I need a concrete timeline for completing the review.
Questionnaire back to Herbert Smith by Friday. Realistically 2–3 weeks for the assessment after that.
So mid-May earliest for sign-off. OK. I'm noting this in the risk register and flagging it at the next leadership weekly. This needs to be tracked formally.
Batch of 12 SEPA transactions failed with timeout errors between 2–3pm UK. Connection to the processor is timing out during peak European clearing hours. I think the connection pool is undersized. Tagging @tom-brennan @ryan-kelly to look.
how many connections are you running?
Default — 10.
that's way too low for a live payment processor. same issue we're running into on the Vertex side with primary DB. need to bump this to at least 50 minimum. that's a band-aid though — the whole connection management layer needs a proper rework.
Bumped to 50. Afternoon batch ran clean. Confirming no further timeouts.
Thanks for the quick fix, Ryan. Lukas hadn't noticed the failures — good that we caught it fast. Let's keep it that way.
Sent the completed questionnaire to Herbert Smith Friday. They've acknowledged receipt. Aiming for their assessment in around 2 weeks.
Thanks Sam. Chase them if no response by May 2 — don't let it drift.
Reconciliation differences on EUR amounts — I'm seeing a few pence off on individual transactions. £340 aggregate over the last 10 days. Could be FX rounding but wanted to flag.
Probably rounding in the GBP/EUR conversion at settlement. I'll look at the conversion logic — could be a per-transaction vs net rounding issue.
Thanks. Small numbers now but if we scale up this becomes material fast.
Good call from Lukas today. Volume is tracking well — he wants to discuss ramping beyond the pilot cap at the next call. He's presenting to his board in May and this partnership is a centrepiece.
What's the current pilot cap?
£2M/month for the pilot. Lukas wants to go to £5–8M.
We cannot increase volume until the PSD2 review is complete and I've signed off. That's not a suggestion.
Understood. I'll manage Lukas's expectations on timing.
No update from Herbert Smith yet. Will chase today.
Sam — can you escalate with them rather than just chasing? Lukas has a board meeting May 8 and I need to be able to say something concrete.
Calling them this morning. Will report back.
Reconciliation discrepancy is now at £1,400 over 3 weeks. Lena — had a chance to look at the conversion logic yet?
Not yet, sorry — I got pulled onto Broadgate onboarding this week. Will look at it properly tomorrow.
The amounts are small individually but if we scale to £5–8M/month this becomes a real problem. Worth prioritising.
Is there any risk of this being visible to PayBridge?
Not directly — it's our settlement ledger. But if we have a true-up conversation later it could surface.
Spoke to Herbert Smith. Three remediation items: (1) data processing agreements need updating for EU data subjects, (2) need a documented cross-border data transfer mechanism (likely SCCs), (3) sanctions screening policy needs an EU-specific addendum. These are the blockers before they can sign off.
None of those are surprises. Sam, I need you to own a remediation plan for all three — timelines for each by end of this week.
How long are we looking at for full remediation?
Depends heavily on legal review speed. James needs to look at the DPA changes. Realistically 3–4 weeks after we properly start. Which we haven't yet.
Spoke to Lukas yesterday. He's presenting to his board Thursday (May 7). Needs to know two things: can we scale beyond pilot in June, and what are the compliance blockers. I need something I can give him.
Honest answer: three open remediation items, none completed. I cannot give a sign-off date without knowing when James can review the DPA.
I've drafted the remediation plan. Sanctions screening addendum I can do myself — probably a week. DPA updates and data transfer mechanism both need James's input. He's currently focused on Atlas.
So we're essentially blocked on legal bandwidth?
Partly. James has a lot on — Atlas, Vertex, and now this. Not trying to make excuses, just flagging the constraint.
I'm going to tell Lukas we're targeting end of May for full compliance sign-off and June for volume ramp. That gives us a story for the board.
Daniel — please don't commit to end of May without checking with me first. I can't guarantee that timeline and I don't want to be in a position where we've promised something externally that I haven't agreed to.
I hear you. But I can't tell our first EU customer that we have no timeline at all. I'll caveat it as a target.
Looked at the reconciliation issue. Confirmed: rounding error in GBP/EUR conversion at settlement. We're rounding per-transaction instead of on the net settlement amount. Fix is straightforward — changing the rounding to apply at net level. Pushing this week.
Thanks Lena. Running total is at £1,850 now. Once fix is live we'll need to true up the historical discrepancy — I'll work out the adjustment.
Rounding fix deployed and confirmed. Going forward recon should be clean.
Completed sanctions screening addendum draft. Rachel — when you get a chance, can you review? I think it covers the EU-specific requirements but want your eyes on it before it goes to Herbert Smith.
Will look at it tomorrow, Sam.
Just got off the phone with Lukas. His board approved expanding the PayBridge relationship subject to a confirmed production timeline. He was positive but did mention they've had an approach from a competitor. Not threatening — but the subtext was there.
Not ideal timing. What's a realistic timeline we can actually stand behind?
Rachel — where are we on the DPA and data transfer mechanism? Those are the two items blocking sign-off.
I sent James the DPA markup last week. No response yet. He's tied up with Atlas and Vertex both.
I'll chase James directly today. But setting expectations: even if James turns this around quickly, I need a week to review end-to-end before I can sign off. This is our first cross-border compliance framework — I'm not rushing it.
Understood. Will update Lukas — targeting early June. If that slips again we may have a real problem on our hands.