Major banks still struggling on NPP
While the painful rollout of real time payments capability at Australia's major banks continues at a snail's pace, National Australia Bank last night confirmed it is likely to be the first of the industry's big players to offer full PayID services across its digital channels.NAB and CBA have been offering PayID-based transactions to mobile banking customers since the launch of the New Payments Platform in February, but neither has enabled users to send money via their respective internet banking platforms.However, a NAB spokesperson confirmed to Banking Day on Monday night that full PayID-based functionality would be added to its internet banking site in the next month."Since the NPP launched in February, NAB has provided its consumer and business customers access to make and receive fast payments through its digital banking channels, and we look forward to continuing to add more services," the spokesperson said."Currently, NAB customers can create a PayID through internet banking, and will also be able to make and receive fast payments through internet banking in coming weeks."NAB offers customers the widest range of ways to receive fast payments via the NPP, including mobile, email, ABN or BSB, and Account Number."CBA's mobile banking customers account for more than 40 per cent of the two million PayIDs registered in Australia, but the bank declined to say when the service would be extended to users of its internet banking system."We are committed to delivering a solution of the highest quality and integrity to our customers and will add additional functionality over time," a CBA spokesman said.The major banks have come under pressure from the Reserve Bank of Australia to hasten the rollout of PayID services across their distribution channels, following criticism from assistant-governor Michelle Bullock at a parliamentary hearing earlier this month.Westpac and ANZ were missing from the New Payments Platform when it launched in February and have each struggled since to connect their retail customers to the national real time payments network."They had many, many years to get on top of this and so to discover, as we were going live, that they weren't ready, was a bit disappointing really," Bullock told parliament in the middle of August."The Payments System Board has been very forthright in letting the banks know that they've not been happy about this."An ANZ spokesman confirmed that the bank began offering PayID to retail customers last Wednesday, although the service was still not available to mobile banking users.ANZ launched PayID to small business and institutional customers at the end of July and says its customers sent $2.2 billion worth of NPP-related payments up to August 24.Most ANZ retail customers are now able to access the PayID service through internet banking, but technical problems mean that people with some types of accounts are still not able to send payments in real time. Westpac, which has the oldest core banking platform in the banking sector, has encountered the biggest challenges among the major banks. A Westpac spokesperson revealed that the country's second largest bank had begun rolling out full