Page 20 - GS170501

Views

NACHA stated that B2B payments are growing, but association in the country, and is
not with equal gusto. Traditional B2B credit formats owned by the nation's largest banks.
saw volume increases more than 5 percent over 2015 It has been working with several
leading banking technology firms to
totals. And it's not just simple credit payments going over create a real-time payment platform.
the ACH; more businesses are sending payments and In April, TCH stated it was readying
remittance information together. a pilot focusing on real-time bill
payments with financial technology
Many of the nation's largest banks and leading financial technology companies firm Fidelity National Information
have been working on faster payments schemes, with encouragement from Services Inc. TCH and FIS also
the Federal Reserve. One of those, the Zelle Network, recently stated it had revealed an incubator program for
processed 170 million P2P payments totaling $55 billion in 2016. Zelle, created real-time payment initiatives that
by Early Warning Services LLC (owned by seven of the largest U.S. banks), now leverages FIS payment technologies
includes 20 banks and credit unions. and a real-time platform built by
TCH. The incubator service offers
Consumers can access the network using their institutions' mobile banking centralized processing of payments
apps to send and receive payments with registered mobile phone numbers or in real time, with standard interfaces
email addresses. The network said it is poised to reach 85 million consumers to bank applications and continuous
through participating institutions' mobile banking apps. "With Zelle, we'll management of new releases and
collectively reach more U.S. bank consumers than any other person-to-person functionality.
payments network and deliver a faster, safer and easier payments experience,"
said Thong Nguyen, President of Retail Banking and Co-head of Consumer "For real-time payments to truly
Banking at Bank of America, a Zelle owner bank. take off, banks of all sizes need to
have easy, affordable access," said
Many banks that own Early Warning are also working through The Clearing Russ Waterhouse, Executive Vice
House to advance faster payment schemes. TCH is the oldest payments President for Product Development
and Strategy at TCH.

In addition, more than a dozen other
U.S. organizations are working on
faster payments schemes.

ACI Worldwide Inc., which provides
technology support for faster
payments in the United Kingdom,
has been ramping up for a similar
role in the United States. In April,
ACI released its immediate payments
platform, known as UP, as a cloud-
hosted solution, a move it said
should make it possible for banks
and credit unions of all sizes to share
connectivity to real-time networks,
like Zelle and TCH.

ACI already has a deal with banking
technology giant Jack Henry &
Associates Inc., which is using UP
to link its 10,000 financial institution
clients and their customers to real-
time payment networks.

Patti Murphy is Senior Editor of The Green
Sheet and President of ProScribes Inc. She is
also the founder of InsideMicrofinance.com.
Email her at patti@greensheet.com.

20