AUDDIS
AUDDIS, the Automated Direct Debit Instruction Service, is the Bacs service that lets an organisation send new Direct Debit Instructions to payers' banks electronically instead of on paper. Bacs makes it mandatory for all new service users that submit directly, and it is a precondition for paperless Direct Debit.
Before AUDDIS, a signed Direct Debit Instruction had to be posted to the payer's bank. Under AUDDIS the organisation keeps the signed instruction, or the record of a paperless sign-up, and lodges the details through Bacs. The bank validates them and sets the instruction up on its database, and anything invalid comes back through Bacs messaging on the AUDDIS rejection report with a reason code. Bacs requires AUDDIS of every new service user submitting directly, and an organisation has to be AUDDIS compliant before it can offer paperless Direct Debit, meaning sign-up online or by phone.
Why it matters to a software platform: it is the mechanism underneath a Direct Debit sign-up inside the product. If a platform's customers are to let their own payers set up a mandate in an app or a web page, the collecting arrangement has to be AUDDIS compliant and the sign-up has to meet the paperless rules on what the payer is shown and how the agreement is recorded. Under a regulated-partner model that compliance sits with the regulated party holding the service user arrangement; the platform designs the screens.
What to watch: the reason codes on the AUDDIS and the related reports. Each cancellation or rejection code means something specific, from the payer cancelling to an account closed, and the platform's product should show the customer what it means and what to do next, rather than a bare failure.
Sources
- Bacs, AUDDIS (Automated Direct Debit Instruction Service), 19 October 2026