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EPayments, a UK digital payments company, is officially closing its doors and winding down its business after failing to satisfy regulators, according to a blog post yesterday. 

The company shut up shop in 2020 at the request of the UK regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which had identified “weaknesses” in the firm’s financial crime controls. 

Founded in 2011, EPayments was a payments services firm that provided e-money wallets, pre-paid Mastercards and payment and merchant services. The company had been registered and regulated by the FCA as an Electronic Money Institution (EMI). 

Since the FCA’s request, the payments company has been working with regulators to improves its anti-crime controls. 

“We have over this period been working hard to ensure these are up to the required standard,” the firm said in the blog post. “But in these extremely challenging and unprecedented global economic conditions, and with the business being restricted for such an extended period we can no longer sustain the business to build back to what the FCA require and a ‘business as usual’ state.” 

Unable to build back the business, EPayments will now focus on winding down the business and providing refunds to customers. In 2019, the company held £127 million ($148 million) on behalf of clients, according to filings. 

The Financial Times reported in 2020 adult entertainment, affiliate marketing and crypto industries were among EPayments most important clients. 

The company is encouraging those with funds in their e-Wallets to withdraw them now and for any accounts not open for refunds to contact the company and supply any information required to open the account. 

It also assures customers in a statement that the funds are in safeguarded accounts.

In the UK, personal deposits of up to £85,000 at banks, building societies and credit unions are covered by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS). Deposits to digital payments companies like EPayments are not.

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