New Zealand banks implement 365-day payments

The project is being led by Payments NZ, and it will involve banks such as ANZ, ASB, Bank of China, BNZ, Citi, HSBC, ICBC, Kiwibank, TSB and Westpac, as these banks collectively offer financial services to the majority of consumers in New Zealand. 

Payments NZ officials talked about this new implementation and described it as a step in the right direction in modernising the country’s payments system. In essence, 365-day payments will allow both consumers and businesses to pay and be paid any day of the year, including weekends and public holidays. 

The move to 365-day payments will affect direct credit transactions, direct debits, automatic payments, and bill payments. However, high-value transactions, such as house settlements, will still operate under the existing model, which requires five business days to complete. 

Kiwbank issued a statement and clarified that its payment processing times will remain the same after 26 May. At the time of writing, the bank’s payment processing schedule is from 9 am to 12 am. As for same-day cleared payments such as urgent, high-value payments, they won’t be affected by the new system, which means they will be available on business days only. 

In order to innovate their processes and enable this significant change for payments in New Zealand, Payments NZ, the banks, and the Reserve Bank implemented several changes to the existing payments system without compromising its security and integrity. 

Payments NZ is also working on other projects apart from 365-day payments, including Open Banking and other improvements that aim to modernise New Zealand’s payment systems.

Preparing for the change

Representatives from Payments NZ advised clients to prepare for these upcoming changes, which will come into effect on 26 May 2023. The main thing to watch out for is that electronic bank payments such as automatic payments and direct debit payments may come out on their actual due date, which could be a weekend or public holiday. 

Participating banks have been contacting customers to inform them about how these changes and how it will impact them. Clients who have not received any information from their bank or would like to learn more about these changes are advised to visit their bank’s official website. 

Clients are also advised to check up on the automatic payments that they set up themselves to find out if due dates will be impacted in any way.