Latest News

The Ghana Interbank Payments and Settlement Systems (GhIPSS), a subsidiary of the Bank of Ghana, has introduced a Near Real Time (NRT) Automated Clearing House (ACH) Direct Credit platform that allows Corporate Institutions to make bulk payments much faster.

The service, being rendered in collaboration with the banks, is designed to enhance the efficiency of making bulk payments such as salaries, pensions and dividends within just 15 minutes, instead of the previous four to 24 hours.

A statement from GhIPSS said the platform provided corporate Institutions a viable alternative to Cheques and allowed them to credit the accounts of beneficiaries on a bulk payments list within 15 minutes. NRT is an addition to GhIPSS’ existing ACH Direct Credit platform.

This means, under this new ACH DC NRT regime, it will take 15 minutes for money sent from one source account to multiple accounts in different banks to be credited to the receivers’ accounts instead of the previous 24 hours.

“Corporate institutions have the opportunity to make bulk payments anytime between 6:00pm the previous day and 3:00pm the following day and the payees’ accounts will be credited in 15 minutes – almost in real time,” it explained.

GhIPSS said NRT is an efficient payment option, which provided transparency and certainty of payments because it allowed banks of corporate institutions to re-present returned payment details within the same session.

“Corporate institutions can correct all payment errors for re-presentment without fear of missing payment timelines,” it explained adding that the system also allowed for deadline payments to be met quickly.

“ACH DC NRT can be accessed by organisations through their banks as well as savings and loans companies for the payments of salaries, allowances, pensions, welfare benefits, suppliers and all other bulk payment types.”

The statement quoted GhIPSS CEO, Archie Hesse as saying, “Direct Credit NRT is a major addition to the plethora of electronic payment solutions, which will be extremely useful to businesses and other organizations.”

He encouraged organisations seeking to make faster bulk payments, to use the NRT to ensure that intended recipients received the money almost immediately.

ACH DC is a secure and reliable bulk payments service, which allows corporate institutions to make single or batched payments by electronically transferring funds directly into different bank accounts across different banks within Ghana.

It comes in three forms – Standard ACH DC, Express ACH DC and now the newly introduced ACH DC NRT.

Standard ACH DC allows businesses to make bulk payments to different beneficiary accounts across different banks and recipients’ accounts are credited within 24 hours after payment lists have been submitted to the paying corporate institution’s bank.

However, Express ACH DC allows that same process within four hours, while the now ACH NRT has reduced the time to 15 minutes.

The transaction volume for the GhIPSS Instant Pay (GIP), Ghana’s real-time interbank transfer service,  has gone up by almost 600 per cent in the first half of 2020 compared to the same period last year.

The volume of GIP transactions at the end of June 2020 stood at 2.45 million compared to 350,666 for the same period in 2019.

GIP is an electronic payment system that enables a customer to transfer money from one bank account to another of a different bank or a wallet instantly.

Commenting on the performance, Mr Archie Hesse, the Chief Executive Officer of GhIPSS, said that the persistent growth in GIP transactions was largely because it had allowed people to make and receive payments instantly even without the need to move to a banking hall."With increasing advocacy for electronic payment options due to the coronavirus pandemic, it is anticipated that GIP will continue to enjoy high usage," he said.

Though instant pay can be accessed from the banking halls, it is mostly available on the various internet and mobile banking platforms of the banks. Many Fintechs also ride on the GIP technology for their money transfer services.

Mr Hesse said GhIPSS would enhance public education on GIP to ensure that more people are aware of the service and use it to make payments more convenient and efficient.

He is hopeful that GIP will continue to record growth in patronage as more people turn to electronic forms of payments."With increasing advocacy for electronic payment options due to the coronavirus pandemic, it is anticipated that GIP will continue to enjoy high usage," he said. Mr Hesse expressed the hope that with GIP and Mobile Money Interoperability, two very important payment interventions, people outside the banking sector can be included in the formal financial sector.