New survey on the real demand for instant payments

A recent survey conducted by InstaPay.today highlighted that key stakeholders within the instant payments industry overwhelmingly believe that it is consumer demand driving instant payments, and not new regulations.

The survey was carried out with members of the InstaPay Community – a knowledge hub designed specifically for payments professionals globally. The survey focused primarily on the drivers, influences and challenges with the transition to instant payments and highlighted key perceptions.

Of those surveyed, 75% identified “Satisfying customer demand” as the biggest driver behind the roll out of instant payments. On this, Tom Hay, our Head of Payments and InstaPay Advisory Board member, shared:

“Regulators may be forcing change, but banking customers expect services to be available anywhere, immediately and on-demand.  With payments sitting at the heart of the customer relationship, it comes as no surprise that the move to instant payments is essential to provide the level of service that customers increasingly demand.”

When asked about the challenges behind the adoption to instant payments, 95% of the InstaPay Community surveyed highlighted that “streamlined integration with legacy systems” is key.  However, interestingly, there was a divided view when it came to which technology approach was most beneficial to instant payments implementation – with the approaches being either to “extend current systems by the introduction of a modular framework” or “by introducing a new Payments Hub”.

Tom Hay added: “Whilst some banks are still pursuing the “one size fits all” vision of the payments hub, many now recognise that this approach is too costly and time-consuming to meet the tight timescales and budgets of instant payments projects. Hence we’re seeing more and more requests for open source frameworks such as Icon’s Instant Payments Framework (IPF) that are specifically designed to meet the needs of instant payments quickly and cost effectively.”

You can also download an infographic with the survey results here:InstaPay Infographic