Pay.UK Board
Board members
Our board brings a wide range of knowledge and expertise to guide and deliver change successfully while maintaining a focus on service delivery. Chaired by Mark Hoban, our board directors are listed below:
Mark Hoban
Independent Chair
Mark was appointed Chair of Pay.UK in November 2020.
He is also Chair of the Financial Services Skills Commission and a member of PwC’s Advisory Council. He recently retired as Chair of Flood Re and the Jersey Financial Services Commission.
Mark was the Member of Parliament for Fareham between 2001 and 2015 and was a minister in the UK’s coalition government between 2010 and 2013.
Mark is a chartered accountant.
David Pitt
Executive Director /
Chief Executive Officer
David joined Pay.UK in July 2021.
David has a strong and successful track record delivering high profile projects both in the UK and internationally, and leading organisations through periods of transformational change. This includes the delivery of a transformation strategy at the Government’s Test, Trace and Containment operation where he was Chief Operating Officer, responsible for overseeing the end-to-end process to improve overall delivery across the UK.
Prior to this, David was COO at esure leading the business through major transformational change prior to its sale. He has also held senior roles at RSA Insurance, including CEO, Greater China.
Michael Ellis
Executive Director /
Chief Financial Officer
Michael is an experienced commercial finance professional and has worked in payments for 15 years. A chartered accountant, he was most recently Chief Financial Officer at Vocalink during its acquisition by Mastercard and subsequent integration.
Michael has broad experience within finance, including in the fields of: strategy, mergers and acquisitions, finance transformation, planning, financial reporting, tax, and treasury.
Prior to working in payments Michael gained experience in professional practice, logistics and chemicals sectors.
Anna Bradley
Senior Independent Non-Executive Director
Anna is an experienced Non-Executive Director and Chair. She has a background in regulation, policy, and consumer advocacy, across a variety of sectors.
She is currently Chair of the Solicitors Regulation Authority, and Chair of Scottish Widows Independent Governance Group.
Diane Côté
Independent Non-Executive Director
Diane joined the Pay.UK Board in January 2022. She is an Independent Non-Executive Director of Société Générale Group, ACT Commodities Group and X-Forces Enterprise. She also chairs La Nuova Musica and is a Trustee on the Board of Shaw Trust.
She qualified as a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA-CA) with EY. Her career in financial services spans over 30 years during which she held senior positions in FTSE 100 companies, such as Aviva plc, Standard Life plc. Her last executive role was Chief Risk Officer for London Stock Exchange Group, where she also chaired its Foundation, and its diversity and inclusion executive committee. During that period, Diane also chaired TheCityUK Cyber Security and Resilience Advisory Board and was a member of the European Central Bank (ECB) market infrastructure resilience advisory committee.
Helen Crooks
Independent Non-Executive Director
Helen Crooks is an experienced data and digital leader. Her previous roles include Chief Data Officer at Ofgem and executive roles at Tesco and Virgin Media. She featured in the DataIQ100 power Titan list from 2017-2020, and was recognised with the DataIQ lifetime achievement award, in 2022. She also previously chaired the London Market Data Steering Board.
Helen chairs the External Advisory Group for the UK Parliament Digital Transformation Programme, is a Non-Executive Advisor for Parliament Digital Services, Advisor to Change Consultancy at Practicus and is an Advisor to Data Asset Management Consultancy at Anmut.
Marc Pettican
Non-Executive Director
With over 20 years in the payments arena, Marc Pettican has seen significant development in technology and innovation across the industry, and has often been a driving force in shaping new propositions for Barclays’ corporate portfolio (NFC, EMV, Data Security, eCommerce, Virtual Payments).
Marc joined Barclays more than 30 years ago and has extensive experience in acquiring, payment gateways, data security and commercial payments. He has undertaken a succession of senior coverage, leadership and general management roles, covering small businesses through to global corporates.
He spent two years overseeing the integration of The Logic Group technology provider into Barclaycard, and then moved to become President of Barclaycard Payments, driving the adoption of B2B and virtual payments, across all segments.
Since October 2022, Marc has held the position of Head of Barclaycard Payments, overseeing the end-to-end payments business, spanning issuing and acquiring for small businesses to large multinational corporates.
Outside of this, he serves as the Trustee of Northampton Sport (local Charity).
Lesley Titcomb
Independent Non-Executive Director
Lesley joined the Board in January 2021 as an Independent Non-Executive Director. Lesley is a qualified accountant and has a strong financial services and regulatory background, including the Pensions Regulator and the Financial Conduct Authority.
Currently, Lesley is an Independent Non-Executive Director of the National Bank of Kuwait (International Plc), a Trustee at StepChange, the debt advice charity, and a Governor of the University of Hertfordshire. She has recently been appointed as Chair of the Market Harborough Building Society. She is also a Trustee of Reading Force and the Parliament Choir, both of which are registered charities.
Lars Trunin
Non-Executive Director
Lars is a Board Director at Wise Payments Ltd and TINV Europe AS. As Head of Product for Europe and the UK at Wise, formerly TransferWise, he leads teams focused on helping over 10 million people around the world move their money internationally as quickly, inexpensively and conveniently, as possible. Lars spearheaded the initiative of Wise joining the Bank of England’s Real-Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system as the first Non-Bank Payment Service Provider, and as a direct customer of the Faster Payment System.
Before Wise, Lars founded Raudwara, an Estonian publishing house, authored several bestselling books in mathematics, and worked with the Walt Disney Company in Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa.
He holds an MBA from Saïd Business School, University of Oxford.
Ajay Vij
Independent Non-Executive Director
Ajay Vij specialises in digital transformation and scaling global technology services in financial services. He is currently Vice President for Strategic Industries for Google Cloud EMEA.
Ajay has built his career with technology service integration firms, including Infosys, IBM Global Business Services and Avanade.
Peter Wyman
Independent Non-Executive Director
Peter is an experienced Chair and Non-Executive Director with a current portfolio of appointments in the private, public and third sectors. These include Chair of NHS Blood and Transplant and Sir Richard Sutton Limited, and Chairman of the Board of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales. He is also Deputy Lieutenant of Somerset.
Peter was previously a senior partner at PwC, President of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales, Chair of the Care Quality Commission, Treasurer of Bath University and a Non-Executive Director at Companies House.
All Pay.UK directors are required to declare their conflicts of interest.
Board minutes
From time-to-time, we are required to redact key information from publications where it is necessary to protect commercial confidentiality, candid debate and the financial stability or integrity of Pay.UK, or to comply with our duty of confidentiality. You can read the policy which governs this process, below: