The Reserve Bank has moved to quell fears throughout Australia's burgeoning fintech sector that the country's four major banks will have the power to stymie access to the New Payments Platform.In a speech to a payments conference in Sydney on Tuesday, RBA Assistant Governor Michele Bullock acknowledged the concerns of potential new players over access to the A$1 billion real time payments service."They observe that the system has been built by the financial institutions and governed by a board made up of those institutions, including the four major banks," Bullock told the conference."They worry that these institutions will either make participation very difficult or costly or, alternatively, will have the inside running on developing and launching commercial overlay services."I think there are a few reasons to be optimistic that access will not be an issue."Bullock believes that the economic model of the NPP and the governance arrangements underpinning it will ensure start-up financial services providers secure fair access to the infrastructure.The concerns among local fintechs are widespread. A Fintech Australia survey last year found that 82 per cent of respondents in the fintech sector were demanding more transparent access to the NPP.The findings of that survey were cited in a recent report published by the Productivity Commission inquiry into banking competition.The commission said that safeguards against possible anti-competitive behaviour of the NPP's bank shareholders needed to be strengthened."The NPP is a significant piece of national infrastructure and more transparency and regulation around the process for access is needed to avoid conflicts of interest unduly restricting competition," the commission argued in the report.While Bullock did not directly address precisely how the conflicts of interest highlighted by the Productivity Commission would be managed, she said the structure of the board and the constitution would also provide protection.The Board of NPP Australia comprises nominees from the four major banks and four small financial institutions, two independent directors and a director appointed by the Reserve Bank."Each director has one vote and the constitution notes that an objective of the NPPA is to promote the public interest, including through fair access," Bullock said.Bullock also cited the NPP's mandate to recover costs rather than to make a profit as a factor likely to support access for non-financial institutions wanting to use the real-time capability of the platform."Given that many of its costs are fixed, it is in the interests of NPP Australia to get as many payments through the system as possible to lower the per-transaction cost," she told the conference."NPPA is already engaging with start-ups on how they might utilise the infrastructure."The Productivity Commission wants an independent third party such as the Payments System Board to monitor the fees banks charge non-financial institutions to gain access to the real-time clearing and settlement capabilities of the NPP.The commission is concerned that the RBA's presence on the NPP board might not be sufficient to manage conflicts of interest that could lead the board to unduly restrict access to new competitors.Bullock did not address this concern directly, but noted that