On an annual basis, the ACT is invited by the Bank of England to share how its members are using the CHAPS payment system and to help the Bank understand key trends. This helps the Bank.
The findings we shared with the Bank were that:
- The proportion of CHAPS vs. Faster Payments is approximately the same level as last year for many businesses though an increasing number had reported a decrease in their use of CHAPS;
- A number of respondents had reported an increase in the use of Faster Payments FPS due to the increase in threshold limits set by their bank (rather than pay.uk);
- One asset manager reported that all new process upgrades require the default use case to be Faster Payment;
- Costs and the ease of using Faster Payments for one off payments were drivers for greater use of Faster Payments vs. CHAPS; and
- The general trend seemed to be a reduction in CHAPS over the next 1-5 year.
We asked treasurers what they liked about the existing CHAPS system and were told:
- The lack of settlement limits;
- The irrevocability of the system; and
- Its reliability for settling amounts.
We'd like to extend our thanks to all of those who responded to our short survey.
