RBA governor Philip Lowe has levelled a damning critique of major banks, naming the Commonwealth Bank in particular over an apparent reluctance to fully embrace the New Payments Platform.In his address to the 2019 Australian Payments Network summit in Sydney yesterday, Lowe said these delays were damaging the effectiveness of the NPP as a whole, and penalties were likely to be levied against those responsible for continued foot-dragging."A recurring theme across these summits has been the need to improve customer outcomes [which] aligns very closely with the focus of the Payments System Board," he said. "The Board wants to see a payments system that is innovative, dynamic, secure, competitive, and that serves the needs of all Australians. We will only fully capitalise on the fantastic opportunities out there if we have a payments system that works for the digital economy. "The launch of the New Payments Platform in early 2018 has been an important part of this journey. This new payments infrastructure allows consumers and businesses to make real-time, 24/7 payments with richer data and simple addressing using PayIDs."Lowe pointed to a slide that showed the NPP's monthly transaction values and volumes both tripled over the past year, with an average of 1.1 million payments processed each day in November, worth about A$1.1 billion. He then threw this curve ball to the Commonwealth Bank: "I expect that we will see a further pickup in usage once the CBA has delivered on core NPP functionality for all its customers. The slow implementation has been disappointing and we expect the required functionality to be available soon."One of the consequences of the slower than-promised rollout of the NPP by some of the major banks is that there has been less effort than expected on developing "innovative functionality", Lowe pointed out. "Payment systems are networks, and participants need to know that others will be ready to receive payments and use the network. Some banks have been reluctant to commit time and funding to support the development of new functionality given that others have been slow to roll out their 'day one' functionality."The slow rollout has also reduced the incentive for fintechs and others to develop new ideas. So we have not yet benefited from the full network effects."The Payments System Board considered this issue as part of its industry consultation on NPP access and functionality, conducted with the ACCC earlier this year. As part of that review the NPPA has introduced a 'mandatory compliance framework'.Under this compliance framework, NPPA can designate core capabilities that NPP participants must support within a specified period of time, with penalties for non-compliance. Other NPP stats from Lowe: there are now 86 entities connected to the NPP, including 74 that are indirectly connected via a direct NPP participant. There are at least six non-ADI fintechs that are using the NPP's capabilities to innovate and provide new services to customers. All up, approximately 66 million Australian bank accounts are now able to make and receive NPP payments.