These improved facilities hand back control to British business owners, allowing over 780,000 sterling and foreign currency payments a year to be made without them having to leave the office.

The new payment service can be used to create instructions online for payments within the UK and overseas. Since its launch earlier this month, HSBC has seen over fifteen different currencies4, more that five hundred payments and at least £1.1 million worth of funds pass through the new system in just two weeks. Further benefits of the improved payment capability include:

Speed - faster than posting or faxing instructions, or visiting a branch, helping businesses to manage cash flow and make last minute transactions
Price - CHAPS and SWIFT payments cost £15 per transaction, saving customers up to £6
Convenience - daily payments, up to a limit of £100,000, can be made from anywhere in the world between 8:00am & 3:30pm, Monday to Friday
Flexibility - companies can nominate staff to make payments, monitor any transactions made and fix a currency rate before proceeding
Safety - high level encryption ensures payments are sent securely
Alan Keir, Head of Commercial Banking, Europe, said: "This latest internet upgrade is a win-win situation for our customers. HSBC is leading the way by providing Britain's most comprehensive range of banking options for 21st Century businesses."

He continued: "By removing the manual interaction previously required to make these payments, we're also freeing up more time of the 760 business specialists we have on the high street and the growing network of dedicated staff in our commercial and corporate centres across the UK."