Cross-border instant payments available in Slovenia

The pan-European payments infrastructure for making instant payments in euros is in use in Slovenia since yesterday. Its main feature is that it enables euro instant payments to be made cross-border, instead of merely in Slovenia. An instant payment is received by the payee as soon as the funds are transferred (within ten seconds), irrespective of time or day. Two Slovenian banks have joined the infrastructure to date, taking the total in the euro area to 55 banks. Banka Slovenije’s assessment is that the number of providers reachable inside the infrastructure will rise over the next year, both in Slovenia and in the euro area overall.

Since yesterday, the first two Slovenian banks, Banka Intesa Sanpaolo and Sberbank banka, are part of the pan-European payments infrastructure for making instant payments in euros (TARGET Instant Payment Settlement or TIPS).

TIPS is operated by the Eurosystem, and was set up two years ago. It allows payments to be made 24 hours a day, every day of the year. The payee receives the funds within ten seconds of the payment being ordered by the payer, provided that both payment service providers (those of the payer and the payee) are members of TIPS. There are currently 55 payment service providers who are members of TIPS (including two Slovenian banks).

Banka Slovenije expects the number of payment service providers included in TIPS to rise significantly in 2021. In July of this year the Governing Council of the ECB passed a resolution that as of November 2021 membership of TIPS will be mandatory for all reachable parties in TARGET2 (of whom there are 1,050) who have adhered to the SEPA Instant Credit Transfer scheme. Our expectation is that the other Slovenian banks offering payment services will also join TIPS in 2021.