Online money transfer company OrbitRemit is set to benefit from the New Payments Platform Australia (NPPA) currently being rolled out in Australia.
The platform is a new infrastructure that has been worked on for several years so that customers of different banks will be enabled to make and receive real-time payments at any time of day or night — 24/7.
NPPA has been designed to fulfil four key requirements to make transmitting payments as easy as possible for both businesses and individuals, and these are:
- Speed: Payments can be made in real-time and funds will be made available to recipients almost immediately.
- Available 24/7: Normal banking hours become irrelevant as payments can be made and received at any time.
- Data enriched: More complete remittance information can be sent with payments.
- Simple addressing: PayID is a system that lets consumers address payments to recipients more easily. It uses an identifier such as an email address, phone number or ABN, or an alternative organisational identifier.
Formed in 2014, NPPA was set up to oversee the new platform's build and operation. Owned by 13 financial institutions that are taking part in the project, the platform launched and went live recently and is being used by employees of participating financial institutions, who are already sending payments to each other.
It is envisaged that the platform will be rolled out to the public early in 2018.
For OrbitRemit, the NPP infrastructure means that with the real-time transfer of data and value, their Australian customers will benefit from faster transactions.
The company's General Manager at OrbitRemit Australia states: “The NPP is going to be a real game-changer for both businesses that accept payments, as well as individuals that simply want to transfer funds to each other. From the business perspective, it takes out the whole issue of having to check the bank statement the next day to see if funds have actually been paid — they’ll be there instantly! On the personal side, it’s going to make life a lot easier. When people want to send you some cash, you’re not going to have to rattle off BSBs and account numbers, it will all be tied to a unique identifier like an email address or mobile number.”
International money transfers have developed quickly over the last few years, with many new companies taking advantage of developing technology to challenge the main banks and financial institutions with monopolies over this type of business and have also tended to charge customers high fees for the privilege of using their services.
The financial institutions are aware of these challenges to their business model, and many have been speeding up and implementing same-day transfers for both businesses and individual customers.
Innovative companies such as OrbitRemit have seen a gap in the market and used new technology to cut through the often slow response from older and settled financial operators, generating new business and ensuring their clients get a swift, safe service for transferring money whenever it's needed.
