Payments stakeholders push for XML clarity in the corporate-to-bank space

The ISO20022 XML-based format has been pushed as a means of replacing the mish-mash of different national and proprietary standards used between banks and their corporate customers for initiation of payments and cash reporting.

However adoption of ISO20022 tools by both corporates and banks has so far been patchy and rife with inconsistencies in implementation.

At a three-day meeting at its headquarters in la Hulpe, Belgium, at the end of October, Swift met with leading stakeholders to thrash out a 'Common Global Implementation' blueprint aimed at maximising the standardisation of payment initiation messages related to credit transfers, status messages and direct debits.

Participants agreed on a schedule that would see implementation rules for the latest version of the ISO payment initiation messages finalised by early 2010, with standards relating to cash management messages following soon after. Broader uptake of the agreed standards by financial institutions would be expected from the second half of 2010.

Participants at the meeting included, Bank of America, BBVA, BNP Paribas, Cargill, CITI, Corporate Reference Group (CRG), Danish Bankers Association, Deutsche Bank, Fiat Group, General Electric, HSBC, IKEA, ING, JP Morgan Chase, Nordea, Oracle, RBS, Santander, SEB, Standard Chartered Bank, SWIFT, UK Payments, Utsit, Wuerth and Yara.