Customers of participating financial institutions will be able to use new mobile payments service Paym starting 29 April.
The launch of the service, in which the UK Payments Council has a leading role, will allow customers of participating banks and building societies to make peer to peer payments using only a mobile number.
Adrian Kamellard, chief executive of the Payments Council said: "Our IOU research suggests that every adult in the UK is lending just under £5 ($8.3) per week to someone they know.
"Small sums like this soon add up so it’s great that Paym will give people a new option of quickly and securely paying someone back – whether it’s for lunch, a train ticket or just a cup of tea."
Registration for Paym will be rolled out to customers of Bank of Scotland, Barclays, Cumberland Building Society, Halifax, HSBC, Lloyds Bank, Santander and TSB from 2 April.
Customers of Danske Bank will be able to register from 25 April, while customers of Clydesdale Bank, first direct, Isle of Man Bank, NatWest, The Royal Bank of Scotland, and Yorkshire Bank will be able to register for and use Paym later in the year.
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By GlobalDataNationwide Building Society will join in early 2015 and Metro Bank and Ulster Bank are finalising plans.
According to research commissioned by the developers of Paym, UK consumers tot up an average of £255.81 each year in IOUs and other informal loans to each other, reaching a total value of £12.6bn.
Barclays first launched peer to peer payments in the UK in February 2012, with its app Pingit, and has had a lacklustre response.
While it has been downloaded 2.5m times the app has only sent £350m.
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