The Payments Council, an organization that sets strategy for UK payments, produced a best practice guidelines document on the format of account numbers. The recommendations set out in this document were driven by the results of a survey conducted in 2008 that indicated payments with non-standard account numbers may be prone to delay and setting up Direct Debits for such account numbers may be more difficult.

Some of the key recommendations for banks currently using non-standard account number formats that are set out in the document include:

While no one disputes the benefits that having unified standards regarding account numbers across all banks would provide, the practical reality is that these suggested best practices are quite difficult to deploy. For example, upgrading account systems are massive projects that banks do not approach lightly...or frequently. And, in these financially-troubling times, it may be hard for banks to find the proper ROI for such an upgrade.

Let's not forget that these same UK banks are also obliged to use a different set of account numbers — IBANs — when making euro payments to other SEPA countries, which adds a whole other layer of complexity to instituting these best practices.

So while, in theory, a unified account number system might sound like a fantastic idea, the reality of achieving it may be far more fantastical.