Why Money Advice Organisations Need Preventative Payment Support

You hear it in advice sessions all the time.

“I *thought* I’d cancelled it.”

“I didn’t realise they’d moved the date.”

“I was paid on Friday and by Monday it was all gone.”

By the time someone reaches a money advice organisation, the harm is usually baked in: charges applied, overdraft maxed, essential bills missed. The conversation becomes about repairing damage, not avoiding it in the first place.

For banks, fintechs and advice charities under the Consumer Duty spotlight, this gap between *good intentions* and *timely action* is where a lot of avoidable harm lives.

That’s exactly the space preventative payment tools – like My Direct Debits (MDD) – are built for.

The gap between advice and real‑life behaviour

Most organisations in this space are already doing the big things well.

Budgeting templates. Income-and-expenditure assessments. Prioritisation of essential bills. Breathing space and forbearance. All hugely valuable.

But there’s a missing layer: the **micro‑moments** between advice sessions, when a direct debit, standing order or subscription is quietly about to leave someone’s account.

Those are the moments where:

• A forgotten subscription tips someone into an unarranged overdraft.
• A moved bill date clashes with a delayed benefit payment.
• An old trial they meant to cancel renews at full price.

You can coach someone perfectly on budgeting, but if they only realise a payment is due **after** it’s left, they’re back on the phone to their bank, adviser or creditor.

Preventative payment tools don’t replace budgeting or debt advice. They sit between sessions, providing:

• **Early visibility:** a clear view of *what’s due when*.
• **Nudges at the right time:** reminders before money leaves, not after.
• **Prompts to act:** cancel, reschedule, or move money while there’s still time.

That’s where MDD focuses: closing the gap between well‑intentioned plans and the messy reality of monthly payments.

What we mean by “preventative payment tools”

First, a crucial distinction.

My Direct Debits is *not*:

• a bank-tracking or open banking app
• a budgeting or money management platform
• regulated financial advice

MDD is a **simple, user-controlled reminder and awareness tool**.

People manually add their recurring payments – direct debits, standing orders and subscriptions – and choose when they want to be reminded before each one is due.

MDD:

• does **not** connect to bank accounts
• has **no access** to transactions or balances
• does **not** recommend products or give advice

Instead, it helps people **see upcoming payments before they happen**, and nudges them to act. That might mean:

• Cancelling a subscription they no longer use
• Moving money across so the payment doesn’t bounce
• Calling a creditor to ask for help *before* a missed payment

For partners – banks, fintechs and advice charities – it’s a lightweight, low‑risk way to add a preventative layer to existing support.

Why this matters under Consumer Duty

For regulated firms, the FCA’s Consumer Duty isn’t only about fair outcomes in a narrow, product‑by‑product sense. It’s about **foreseeable harm**.

A lot of that harm comes from:

• **Payment timing mismatches** – bills landing before income
• **Unseen commitments** – dormant subscriptions people forget to cancel
• **Cognitive overload** – too many small payments to track mentally

Many of these are foreseeable patterns, not rare edge cases. Yet the tools customers get are often still reactive: alerts *after* they go overdrawn, or collections activity after a missed payment.

A preventative payment tool contributes to better Consumer Duty outcomes by:

1. **Supporting anticipation, not reaction** Customers see their recurring payments ahead of time and can prepare or intervene.

2. **Reducing avoidable charges and complaints** Fewer surprises mean fewer “I didn’t know that was coming out” disputes – a common source of complaints to banks and subscription providers.

3. **Improving engagement with support options** Reminders can nudge people to contact their bank, energy provider or advice charity *before* they miss a payment – when more options are usually available.

4. **Respecting autonomy and privacy** Because MDD doesn’t connect to accounts or recommend actions, it supports informed decision‑making without crossing into advice or surveillance.

For advice charities and community organisations, the same logic applies – just without the regulatory language. Preventative tools help you move from being the “emergency service” to being part of everyday financial habits.

How preventative tools complement debt advice

Advice organisations already do incredible work. The question is how to **extend the impact** of that work into the weeks and months between appointments.

Here’s how something like MDD can slot alongside existing processes.

1. From “here’s your budget” to “here’s how you’ll live it day to day”

Many clients leave a session with a budget and a prioritised list of creditors and bills.

A preventative payment tool turns that list into a **calendar of real‑world payment events**, with timely reminders:

• Council tax due on the 2nd – reminder three days before
• Rent due on the 5th – reminder seven days before
• Non‑essential subscription on the 10th – reminder 10 days before to consider cancelling

Instead of a static sheet of paper, the client has a dynamic view that reflects how their month actually unfolds.

2. Supporting vulnerable clients without taking away control

For people living with cognitive impairments, fluctuating mental health, executive function challenges or simply overwhelming life circumstances, remembering who gets paid when can be daunting.

Because MDD is simple and user‑controlled, it can be:

• set up with support during an advice session
• adjusted easily by the person or their trusted helper
• used without exposing bank data or requiring technical confidence

The client stays in control of their information and decisions. The tool simply reduces the cognitive load.

3. Turning “I’ll do it later” into concrete action

Every adviser has heard it: “I’ll cancel that when I get home.” “I’ll call the provider next week.”

Life gets in the way. A preventative tool acts as a **behavioural bridge** between intention and follow‑through. A reminder a week before a non‑essential subscription renews is a prompt to:

• finally cancel that streaming service they don’t use
• downgrade a gym membership
• switch to a cheaper plan

You’re not giving advice inside the tool; you’re making it easy for people to act on the advice they’ve already received.

Why banks and fintechs should care as much as charities do

From a bank or fintech perspective, this is not just a “nice to have for vulnerable customers”. It’s commercially and operationally relevant.

Lower operational friction

Customers who repeatedly go overdrawn because of forgotten payments generate:

• inbound calls and chats
• complaints around direct debits and card payments
• disputes around cancellations and refunds

Reducing these avoidable triggers frees up capacity and improves staff morale.

Healthier, more stable relationships

When customers feel out of control with their payments, they often blame their bank – even if the bank followed every rule.

Supporting a preventative tool shows a different posture: “We want to help you see what’s coming so you can stay in control.”

That kind of partnership mindset builds trust. And trust matters when you’re introducing new digital tools or support pathways.

Better use of your existing support ecosystem

Many banks and fintechs already invest heavily in:

• specialist support teams
• signposting to charities and community partners
• content around budgeting and money skills

A preventative payment tool helps **connect the dots**. Instead of a generic link to support content, you can prompt: “You’ve told us your council tax and rent both go out early in the month. Here’s a simple way to keep track – and here’s where to get help if you’re worried.”

Again, MDD doesn’t sit inside the bank’s data environment. It’s an external, user‑controlled service that customers can choose to use. But it can be part of your suggested toolkit.

Addressing typical partner concerns

When we talk with potential partners – banks, fintechs, advice charities – a few questions come up regularly.

“Isn’t this what open banking tools already do?”

Open banking tools are powerful, but they’re not always accessible or appropriate for every customer.

MDD is intentionally **lighter touch**:

• no bank connections
• no data‑sharing consents to manage
• no categorisation of spending

For some people, that simplicity and separation from their bank account lowers the barrier to actually using it.

“Do we risk this being seen as advice?”

No. MDD does not give advice, make recommendations or prioritise bills for users.

It simply:

• stores the payments the user chooses to enter
• sends reminders on the schedule the user chooses
• prompts the user to review or act if they wish

You can frame it clearly as a **reminder and awareness tool** that sits alongside, not instead of, regulated advice and formal debt solutions.

“Will people actually keep it up to date?”

That’s a fair concern. In practice, once people have experienced the benefit of being reminded before a big or awkward payment, they tend to add more over time.

Partners can also:

• weave setup into advice sessions or onboarding journeys
• encourage small, specific first steps (e.g. “Add your top three bills today”)
• signpost back to the tool in follow‑up communications

The goal isn’t a perfect dataset. It’s **meaningful coverage of the payments that cause the most stress**.

What collaboration can look like

Different organisations will want different levels of involvement. Common patterns we see include:

• **Signposting:** Including MDD as one of the practical tools you recommend, alongside your own content and support.
• **Integrated journeys:** For example, adding a “stay on top of your bills” step after a successful I&E assessment, where the adviser helps the client set up key payments in MDD.
• **Campaign partnerships:** Joint awareness work around common pain points like subscription creep, bill‑date changes, or the post‑Christmas period.

In every case, the principle is the same: you provide the expertise and advice; MDD helps the person actually follow through on that advice at the right time.

If you’d like to see how this feels from a user’s perspective, you can try setting up a few payments yourself in MDD – it takes minutes and you don’t need to share bank details. You can create an account here: [sign up free](/auth).

Why this matters now

Household budgets remain tight. Interest rates, rent, energy, food – none of these pressures are going away quickly.

Against that backdrop, **avoidable harm** from missed or poorly timed payments feels particularly unnecessary. The technology now exists to give people simple, privacy‑respecting tools that alert them *before* money leaves their accounts.

For banks and fintechs, this is about living the spirit of Consumer Duty – designing for real human behaviour, not just compliant processes. For advice charities and community groups, it’s about extending your impact beyond the advice room.

My Direct Debits sits in that middle ground: a straightforward, user‑controlled way to help people see what’s coming and act while there’s still time.

If you’re exploring how to add more preventative support into your customer or client journeys, we’d love to talk about collaboration – whether that’s simple signposting, co‑designed pilots, or deeper partnership. You can see how MDD works in more detail here: [How it works](/how-it-works).

Because the earlier someone gets a nudge, the fewer difficult conversations they – and you – need to have later.