EBA CLEARING reported that more than 55 RT1 and STEP2 participants across 14 countries are preparing to adopt its Fraud Pattern and Anomaly Detection Verification of Payee (FPAD VOP) solution to deliver Verification of Payee (VOP) checks required under the Instant Payments Regulation. The participants are expected to connect hundreds of payment service providers across Europe and already represent more than 40% of traffic in STEP2 and RT1. A May 2025 release of the VOP functionality integrated the European Payments Council’s Directory Service into the offering, aligned the VOP interface with the European Payments Council application programming interface, and added additional requesting and responding options. Connectivity choices were also expanded to include managed connectivity over SWIFTNet and SIANet, alongside existing options.