It's real time payments in 2017 - or a metaphoric whole of industry bust for the Australian banking sector.This hazard has a bright report card, with the custodians of the New Payments Platform unwavering in their optimism on progress.For Australia's banking sector, real time equates to a forced march into service.The business case informing a investment in the NPP formed up over recent years in the face of spears aimed by the Reserve Bank of Australia, a considered if languid competition regulator.Following a year of despair in 2016, banking is transitioning across 2017 to a period of more promise and reform at long last. The NPP, needed in Christmas 2016 just as badly as it was needed in Christmas 1996, should be up and flying in time for next year's end of year consumption rituals.Fingers crossed, the industry's custodians have it right that banks, the NPP and RBA are all working to plan and a sequence of industry headaches will be alleviated.If the NPP is missing at Christmas 2017 there will be few defences.It will be a staged introduction for the NPP, with 13 bank pioneers (the bulk of customers) on board. The Reserve Bank of Australia is refreshing its systems too. Its RITS systems will be reshaped to cater to a 24/7 assurance on system liquidity.Unveiled in December? November? When? There must be fun and games ahead and banks eager to roll it out.Above all the industry needs a convincing story to tell and branding to establish. We've no idea what nifty name is planned for the BPAY engineered initial "convenience" service. Wombat Pay, maybe. Each bank will have to reposition their apps around offerings reliant on the new platform and then there are the fintech resellers and disruptors as well.BPAY - separate to the NPP but the same gang of banks - is curator of the first "overlay" or app. Most in the NPP collective will push that.Branding is a topic BPAY, banks and the NPP will talk about some time next year.A torrent of NPP payments apps is one scenario (given the fintechers) and an excess of brands. There's social progress in the NPP and its arrival will animate payments behaviour and in theory a stimulus to output.Pay your mate, pay your mum, pay your bill. Easier than ever, once more 'in theory'.No more five day waits for money in the years when Easter meets ANZAC Day.Finally, an inbuilt, crushing inconvenience surrounding the banking experience will be overcome.In doing so, Australian banking will be nuking a museum piece in the legacy direct entry system, a set-up which was already stale by the 1990s and an icon of oligopoly obstinacy on investment pathways. Sweating assets for yield is a core discipline in management and a hallmark of Australian banking industry practice. So the clapped out kit and methods trudged along, adhering to rules worked out decades ago.The result: more contradiction, an epic social service corralled into disregard, payments patently years behind the times.Prayerful readers had better be on