Faster electronic payments are a game changer

Monday, 19 February, 2018

By Terry Millett, Newcastle Permanent CEO

New payment services launched this week will forever change how Australians make electronic payments and handle money.

Leading the charge, Newcastle Permanent was among the first financial institutions in the country to launch these two new services to all its customers, offering a simpler and faster way to send and receive payments via Internet Banking and Mobile Banking Apps. 

You may not have heard much about these new services—Osko by BPAY® and PayID—as not all financial institutions, including three of the four major banks, have fully launched these services to all their customers yet. However, Osko and PayID are part of a major multi-year infrastructure project of the Reserve Bank of Australia and Australia’s financial institutions and create a significant shift to how electronic payments are made. 

Let me explain why Osko and PayID are so revolutionary.

Prior to the launch of Osko and PayID if you wanted to transfer money to someone who doesn’t bank with the same financial institution as you, it could take up to three business days for the money to appear in their account, despite the fact the money was deducted from your own account the moment you made the payment. Osko changes this. 

Osko enables a payment to appear in the recipient’s account within a matter seconds, rather than days. 

No matter whom you transfer the money to, no matter which financial institution they bank with (provided they have Osko too), if you use Osko to make the payment, the money will appear in the recipient’s account almost instantly, and it is available 24-hours a day, seven days a week. 

Think about those times when you would normally use cash to pay someone. Those times such as splitting the bill for dinner, paying the babysitter, paying back a mate who bought your ticket to the concert, or even paying back the colleague who did the coffee run. With Osko, you can pay them back in near real-time without cash.

'But wait', I hear you say. 'I still have the hassle of getting their BSB and account number'. 

This problem is solved by the companion feature for Osko that was also launched this week. It’s called PayID and it’s also a payments game-changer. 

PayID means you’ll never need to remember your BSB or account number ever again. PayID allows you to link an easy to remember 'alias', such as your mobile phone number or email address to one of your eligible bank accounts. Our customers can simply register for PayID through Internet Banking or our Mobile Banking Apps. 

Once you’ve registered your PayID, when someone wants to pay you, or you want to pay someone else, you simply share your PayID (your mobile phone number or email address) instead. Your friends will no longer be able to use the excuse they didn’t pay you back because they didn’t have your account number!

Another very handy feature is the name of the person who owns the PayID will be shown to you before you approve the payment using Osko – giving you peace of mind that you’ve paid the right person.

This is an exciting development in the world of payments technology and I’m thrilled that Newcastle Permanent is able to offer these new, game-changing services to our customers.