ICICI Bank and Axis Bank have become the first banks to sign up for SWIFT’s global payments innovation initiative, which is aimed to enhance cross-border payments by making use of SWIFT’s messaging platform and global reach. There are more than 70 banks which are part of the initiative globally. In its first phase, the initiative will focus on business-to-business payments. Designed to help corporates grow their international business, improve supplier relationships and achieve greater treasury efficiencies, the new service will enable corporates to receive an enhanced payments service directly from their banks. The key features would be same day use of funds, transparency and predictability of fees, end-to-end payments tracking and transfer of rich payment information. SWIFT and the participating banks will discuss details of the initiative at Sibos 2016 in Geneva.
