Everything you need to know about Faster Payments

Faster Payments allows users to move money around their accounts, and to other people’s, within seconds, providing more freedom when banking online. Users no longer have to wait a whole day or more for money to transfer. Continue reading to discover everything there is to know about Faster Payments.

What are Faster Payments?

The Faster Payments service was set up in 2008 and is a type of electronic payment transfer designed to speed up the process of sending money to another bank or building society account within the UK. Its aim is to reduce the payment processing time of bank-to-bank payments and is now the most common method of everyday money transfers in the UK.

Have you ever had to pay a supplier immediately to make sure you receive goods or services straight away? If they don’t take cards and need the cash up front, it may be the only way.

In addition, if you need to pay expenses or make payroll payments quickly, Faster Payments is your best option.

How long do Faster Payments take?

Faster Payments do what they say on the tin: they make payments faster. In some cases, transferring money can take up to two hours to show in the recipient’s bank account, but this can be rare. Most of the time, payments are transferred immediately and can be seen within seconds.

What are the rules of Faster Payments?

In order to send money via Faster Payments, your bank or building society, and the recipient’s, must be signed up to the service. Due to the service being set up in 2008, all UK banks and building societies are now signed up.

When making a payment, you need to have the recipient’s name, bank account number and sort code. Confirmation of Payee steps will be taken then as your bank checks whether the details are correct. Enter your amount and confirm the payment. The recipient will receive the money in seconds.

In terms of limits, there is an overall limit of £1 million, though some banks lower that to around £250,000 or as low as £10,000. To check how much you can send, contact your bank or check its website for details.

How do you set up Faster Payments and are there any charges?

Fortunately, banking has made sending money via Faster Payments very easy for consumers. There is no need to set up or sign up to anything in regards to Faster Payments. If the bank has signed up to the service - which is more likely than not - the money you’re sending will automatically be sent using Faster Payments.

Also, unlike CHAPS, there is no charge for using the service. There can be a charge but most banks tend to waive any fees.

What are the alternatives?

The two alternative payment methods for transferring funds are Bacs and CHAPS. Bacs are used for more regular payments, like a company paying salary to staff. These payments can take up to three working days.

CHAPS offers same-day transfers like Faster Payments, but is more often associated with larger one-off payments, like paying a deposit on a house.

Faster Payments with Interbacs

Using our powerful payment platform, you can process your payments faster. With Interbacs, you can either create an output file or connect to our powerful API to push your payment data to our payment platform. This data could be coming from accounts or invoicing systems you use to generate your payment data.

Once the data is in our system, it can be submitted for payment any hour of the week. The service is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, making things easier for you.

If you’d like to sign up for our Payment Services or would just like to find out more about what we offer at Interbacs, contact us on 0161 667 0758 or email us at sales@interbacs.com.