Australia’s High Value Clearing System has adopted the ISO 20022 messaging standard, completing a four-year migration. The HVCS handles the exchange of high value payments, usually between financial institutions. Payments are settled using the Reserve Bank Informational and Transfer System (RITS) and participants hold exchange settlement accounts within RITS to manage settlements. HVCS has 50 participants. The move to ISO 20022 allows payment messages to carry more data. The Australian Payments Network, which co-ordinated the changeover from an older messaging format, said it will lead to improvements in process automation, interoperability and corporate customer experience. AusPayNet chief executive Andy White said: “Among other benefits, the new messaging standard will allow more structured remittance information and identification of parties in the payments chain, aiding know your customer, anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing efforts, and sanctions screening.” White said the migration was the biggest and most complex project AusPayNet has undertaken. The Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (Swift), which wrote the standard, said ISO 20022 has been taken up by financial institutions around the world. Reserve Bank head of payments settlements, Greg Johnston, said the industry still has a lot of work to do to bed down the migration and start getting benefits from the new standard.