Amazon quietly becomes a UK e-money institution — with two telling restrictions
Amazon Payments UK Limited is now an authorised electronic money institution in the United Kingdom. The authorisation appeared on the FCA's Financial Services Register with an effective date of 15 July 2026. As of publication, Amazon hasn't announced it — Amazon Pay's own UK licence page still cites only its older payment institution authorisation — and we couldn't find it reported anywhere else.
Like the Brite Payments UK EMI grant we broke in June, this one surfaced in License Watch, our monitoring feed built directly on regulators' registers.
What the register shows
| Entity | AMAZON PAYMENTS UK LIMITED |
| Register | FCA Financial Services Register (UK) |
| Reference (FRN) | 1041721 |
| Companies House | 11049457 |
| Status | "Authorised Electronic Money Institution" |
| Effective | 2026-07-15 |
You don't have to take our word for it — verify it on the FCA register. The status wording above is the regulator's own.
Two more entries on the same register complete the picture:
- Amazon Payments UK Limited (FRN 799814) has held a UK Authorised Payment Institution licence since 10 July 2018 — that's the authorisation Amazon's public licence page still points to.
- Amazon Payments Europe S.C.A. (FRN 900946) — Amazon's Luxembourg e-money entity, which historically served UK customers under EEA passporting and the post-Brexit temporary permissions regime — now shows as "Cancelled - Authorised EMI" on the UK register.
Read together: Amazon's UK payments business has moved from a Luxembourg e-money licence plus a UK payment institution licence to a native, full UK e-money authorisation. The post-Brexit re-domiciliation is complete.
The restrictions are the interesting part
The new authorisation comes with two requirements, both effective from day one (15 July 2026), both published on the register:
- "Amazon Payments UK Limited will not appoint any agents or distributors."
- "Amazon Payments UK Limited will not provide Account Information Services or Payment Initiation Services."
That's a precise scoping. No agents or distributors means this licence serves Amazon's own business — marketplace settlement, stored balances, gift-card-style e-money, seller payouts — not a payments network built on third parties. And the AIS/PIS carve-out means that despite Amazon leaning into UK open banking at checkout earlier this year, the open banking rails behind any Pay by Bank experience must come from a third-party provider — Amazon's own licence explicitly doesn't cover them.
For merchants and sellers, an EMI authorisation is a real upgrade over a payment institution licence: it permits issuing e-money and safeguarding customer funds, on top of the full range of payment services. Held balances, faster payouts, stored value — the difference between moving money and holding it.
A pattern, not a one-off
This is the second unannounced UK EMI grant we've caught on the register this year, after Brite Payments (FRN 1033237, effective 21 April 2026). The same week Amazon's authorisation took effect, the register also shows a fresh UK authorisation for Remitly U.K., Ltd, among others.
The through-line: since Brexit ended EEA passporting into the UK, payments companies that are serious about the UK market are taking native FCA authorisation — and the register shows it weeks or months before any announcement, if an announcement ever comes.
Why you're reading it here first
License changes land in the register before the press release. Amazon's grant has been in effect since mid-July and, as far as we can tell, hasn't been covered anywhere.
That's the gap License Watch exists to close: we monitor regulators' registers and publish every grant, cancellation, and revocation in a weekly digest, with a citation link to the regulator's own record on every line. No claim without a citation. If we can't cite it, we don't publish it.
Read the latest issue, or request access to the weekly digest.
PaymentProviders.io is an informational service. Registry data belongs to the issuing regulators; status labels reflect the regulator's own wording. This article is not financial or legal advice, and PaymentProviders.io is not affiliated with Amazon.