Unlocking payment confirmations for all
Bringing payment confirmations to the whole Swift community
Unlocking payment confirmations for all
Since the 22 November 2020, every MT 103 sent on the Swift network contains the final confirmation on its outcome.
That means that every eligible institution will need to be able to update the Tracker when a payment has been credited to the end beneficiary, rejected or transferred outside of the Swift network.
To help you on this journey, we have a number of automated and manual ways you can confirm your payments.
Why universal payment confirmations?
Being able to track and confirm payments in real-time is fundamental in the world of modern commerce. All banks in a payments chain need to work together to bring this to reality.
We took the first step towards achieving this through Swift GPI in 2018, with the introduction of the Unique End-to-End Transaction Reference (UETR) for all payments.
The UETR enables full end-to-end tracking of all cross-border payments on the Swift network.
With Universal Confirmations, the ordering customer of a payment knows at any moment where is the payment and when the final beneficiary has been credited.
Payment confirmations - confirmation funds have hit the beneficiary account - are now the next crucial piece in the puzzle.
That’s why, by end 2020, it will be mandatory for all financial institutions receiving payments (MT 103 messages) to confirm when a payment has been credited to the account of the beneficiary.
Why are payment confirmations crucial?
End-to-end tracking and confirmation of credit are essential for two reasons:
They enable financial institutions to provide an enhanced experience to customers
They are the building blocks for developing future payment services
Customers today expect to be able to track all their payments from end to end, and know with certainty when the funds have reached the end recipient’s account. This becomes all the more important for critical payments.
What’s more, business processes and supply chains increasingly rely on payment confirmations: without it, sellers may not release the goods.
We are also developing future Swift GPI services based on the ability to track and confirm payments. And these same capabilities enable financial institutions to build their own value-added services for their customers on top of gpi.
What to do if you’re already a Swift GPI customer?
Universal Confirmations brings the benefits of end-to-end tracking to all cross-border payments sent on Swift. For gpi customers, this brings added value as all your payments, regardless of whether they’re sent as gpi or not, will now be fully trackable to the end beneficiary.
How will Swift GPI customers be impacted by Universal Confirmations?
The requirement to update the Swift Tracker will be for all MTs 103 received on FIN that do not immediately result in another MT 103 on FIN. The gpi rules and their related benefits apply in addition for payment messages sent with field 111 Service Type Identifier in the header and for received payments according to your gpi Directory scope for your BICs registered for Swift GPI.
Otherwise, for all incoming transactions, across all currencies, corridors, subsidiaries and branches, you’ll need to update the Tracker within two business days as per Universal Confirmations rules, including:
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If a payment has been credited to the end beneficiary
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The payment has been rejected
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The payment has been transferred to an agent outside of FIN
Will gpi customers be forced to register all their BICs for gpi?
No, you can keep the split to register some but not all of your BICs on gpi.
As gpi customers, are we going to receive confirmation from the Tracker automatically on behalf of a non-gpi institution?
When a gpi-enabled MT 103 (field 111) is sent over FIN by a gpi customer, the Tracker will automatically generate confirmations and distribute it to the relevant gpi customers per status update. This will also occur when the Tracker receives the confirmation from a non-gpi bank when there were gpi customers involved in previous legs of the transaction. Those confirmations will have the same format as gpi confirmation (incl STI=001). gpi customers must however be ready to receive confirmations with less data elements when provided by non-gpi banks, for example, providing details on deducts in payment confirmations are not mandatory for non-gpi banks.
I still have questions, how can I find out more?
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If you have a technical question, you can raise a ticket with our support team through your MySwift profile, or contact your Swift Account Manager.
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Check out our comprehensive FAQ document (requires MySwift profile)
The five ways to confirm payments
We have a number of user friendly automated and manual ways for you to confirm your payments:
The Basic Tracker
To support non-gpi banks with limited cross-border payments volumes, our free Basic Tracker allows you to manually confirm payments.
Through the Basic Tracker, you can meet payment confirmation requirements, access basic search and tracking features, check your compliance with the mandate and have an easy upgrade path to the full version of the gpi Tracker if you wish.
Automated MT 199 confirmations
You can confirm your payments by sending an interbank payment message (MT 199) to a dedicated gpi Tracker BIC through your existing Swift interface.
This message then triggers an update to the Tracker and provides payment confirmation to the ordering bank.
Batch confirmations
Our new CSV format (Comma Separated Values) can be used to reduce the implementation effort of Universal Confirmations to a simple end-of-day export file from your payment application.
To implement the CSV option to confirm payments, you need to assess that your payment system (proprietary or from your supplier) supports the generation of the CSV format provided by Swift.
Alliance Access or Entry consume the CSV files and will convert each entry in the file(s) into a payment status update to the Tracker.
Benefits of batch confirmations
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Reduce the implementation effort to a simple end-of-day export file from your payment application
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No need for IT development as most applications have a built-in feature to generate an export file for posting
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An automated solution for universal confirmations of payments, limiting the manual effort required to manage exceptions when the payment cannot be credited immediately
How Batch Confirmations work?
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Every MT 103 payment received will be processed in a payment application, which will update the general ledger on the payment value date
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The payment system generates CSV files regularly or in an end-of-day report to confirm the status of the daily processed transactions
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The CSV file(s) will be processed by the Alliance interface and converted to individual payment updates in the Tracker
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4. Depending on the step 2, the Tracker is immediately updated or as soon as the payment application has performed a bulk of credit operations or at the end of the day. User can opt for API or MT 199 updates.
Available now:
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CSV specifications here
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Readiness Portal for confirmations operational
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Basic Tracker GUI, live
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Release of Alliance Access/Entry with built-in batch confirmation functionality*
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SR 2020 mandatory confirmations, test phase
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SR 2020 mandatory confirmations, go-live
* - Alliance Access & Entry 7.5 & 7.4.50
- AMH 3.x or 4.0 via consulting services
- Other FIN interfaces and payment applications, consult your supplier
Confirm via API calls
Using API calls to confirm payments is a fast and efficient way to update the gpi Tracker. All Swift users can use the Swift SDK or the Swift Microgateway to update the Tracker using the unique tracking code of the transaction.
ISO 20022
To help reduce the burden for banks and ease the transition from MT, an ISO 20022-compliant messaging standard will also be available to provide confirmations to the Tracker.
In March 2020, the Swift Board and Executive endorsed ambitious plans for Swift to make the Swift platform richer, smarter and faster. To enable this, and acting on feedback from the community, Swift will enable ISO 20022 messages for cross-border payments and cash reporting businesses starting from the end of 2022. This extends the originally announced date by one year.
Swift has published in MyStandards the new Swift XML ISO channel for Universal Confirmations trck.001. This message can be used to confirm both MT 103 or pacs.008.
Universal Confirmations measurement rules
From 22 November 2020 all eligible financial institutions are now able to provide confirmation on the outcome of all their incoming MT 103 payment instructions to the Tracker, otherwise known as Universal Confirmations.
As part of our Universal Confirmations programme, financial institutions will be measured on whether or not they are confirming 80% of their weekly payments traffic within two business days (either credited to the end beneficiary, rejected, placed on hold or transferred to an agent outside of Swift).The measurement score takes into account all confirmations provided to the Tracker to achieve this compliance threshold. This applies to the mandatory and recommended confirmations as documented in the Universal Confirmations rulebook, including the use case where the receiver is transferring the payment to a next agent outside FIN.
How does Universal Confirmations measurement work?
From 5 September 2020 the official measurement period is in effect. Initially, your Universal Confirmations measurement score will only be visible to yourself. However, from 1 June 2021, your measurement score will be visible to the entire community in the Observer Insights for Swift GPI members and in the Basic Tracker Observer for non-gpi members.
A simple traffic light system will be in place to monitor compliance and will work accordingly:
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Green indicates institutions are fully compliant.
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Orange indicates institutions have not been compliant for one week. In the case of an orange indicator, institutions have 12 weeks to reach compliance before being issued a red rating.
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Red indicates institutions that are not compliant and have missed the 12-week compliance cut off.
It’s important to note that the improvement period is in effect from 5 September 2020. Therefore, if financial institutions are not compliant two weeks after Standards Release 2020 on 22 November, they will receive a red rating.
What happens if I don’t confirm 80% of my payments?
Financial institutions using the Basic Tracker with a ‘red’ status will lose the possibility to search for their outbound transactions in access to the search and tracking features of the Basic Tracker. These will be reinstated once the institution has moved back to green status.
Financial institutions always keep their access to the Basic Tracker, even with a ‘red’ status.
For Swift GPI members, Universal Confirmations are mandatory for any MT 103 received on all BICs and corridors across your institution. Make sure you are ready by checking your Universal Confirmations readiness for all your BICs, branches and subsidiaries in the Universal Confirmation Insights in the Observer.
If you have questions about the measurement rules, you can visit our support tip for more info, or register for one of our upcoming webinars where we’ll discuss the measurement rules in more detail.
Frequently asked questions about Universal Confirmations
Find out the answer to some of the key questions about Universal Confirmations, download the rulebook, and find out how you can get further help.
What is Universal Confirmations and why is it necessary?
Being able to track and confirm payments in real-time is fundamental in the world of modern commerce. All banks in a payments chain need to work together to bring this to reality.
We took the first step towards achieving this in 2018, with the introduction of the Unique End-to-End Transaction Reference (UETR) for all payments.
Payment confirmations - confirmation funds have hit the beneficiary account - are now the next crucial piece in the puzzle. That’s why, since 22 November 2020, it is mandatory for all FIN users in the user categories Supervised Financial Institutions (SUPE) and Payment System Participants (PSPA) to confirm when a payment (MT 103) has been credited to the account of the beneficiary, placed on hold or transferred outside of Swift.
End-to-end tracking and confirmation of credit are essential for two reasons:
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They enable financial institutions to provide an enhanced experience to customers
-
The drive efficiency gains by reducing the burden of exceptions and investigations through proactive confirmations
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They are the building blocks for developing future payment services
What’s more, business processes and supply chains increasingly rely on payment confirmations: without it, sellers may not release the goods.
By which date do I need to confirm payments?
Universal Confirmations on your incoming MT 103 payments is mandatory since 22 November 2020. This is part of the annual Swift Standards Release process and is a mandatory change all FIN users in the user categories Supervised Financial Institutions (SUPE) and Payment System Participants (PSPA).
I’m already a gpi member, do I need to do anything?
Universal Confirmations is mandatory for all 8-character BICs receiving MT 103 instructions. That means that even if you have one of your branches registered for a Swift GPI service, you’ll need to provide confirmations from your other branches which aren’t signed up to Swift GPI. This also includes all country corridors, so if you have certain corridors not on gpi yet, you will need to be able to provide confirmation updates for these messages too.
How long do I have to provide a confirmation update?
You’re required to provide confirmation to the Tracker within a maximum of two business days following the value date in the MT 103.
How can I confirm payments?
There are a number of ways you can confirm your payments, both automated and manual.
For institutions who handle low volumes of customer payments, you can access our free Basic Tracker tool. The Basic Tracker allows you to manually confirm payments, whilst also accessing some basic search and tracking features.
For institutions that handle higher volumes of payments, there are four other options:
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MT 199 – All Swift customers can confirm payments by sending an interbank payment message (MT 199) to a dedicated Tracker BIC through their existing Swift interface.
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Batch confirmations – A batch confirmations standard is available through your Swift Alliance interface, allowing you to reduce the implementation effort to a simple end-of-day export file in CSV format from their payment application.
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API - All Swift users are now able to use the gpi Connector to update the Tracker using the unique tracking code of the transaction.
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ISO 20022 - An ISO 20022-compliant XML messaging standard will also be available to provide confirmations to the Tracker.
What’s the difference between the Basic Tracker and Swift GPI?
The Basic Tracker
The Basic Tracker enables banks handling low volumes of customer payments to provide payment confirmations free of charge. The Basic Tracker also provides a limited set of features to track and search payments, as well as monitor your Universal Confirmations compliance, although these features may be limited if you don’t meet the confirmations mandate.
Swift GPI
Swift GPI, meanwhile, is a paid for service, which includes advanced search and tracking, view on deducts, intermediary routings, send and receive amounts, FX and more, as well as value-added services to reduce friction. In addition, Swift GPI customers are also able to integrate tracking and confirmation features into their customer-facing channels, enabling automated status updates directly to end customers.
How will I be measured on my Universal Confirmations performance?
All eligible FIN users have been measured on their Universal Confirmations compliance since May 2020. Initially, this is only be visible to yourself. This information will be available as a separate tab in the Basic Tracker (Note: for gpi members, your Universal Confirmations performance for all your BICs is already available in Observer Insights.)
From 1 June 2021, your Universal Confirmations compliance will become visible to the whole community, in the Observer Insights (for gpi members) and in the Basic Tracker Observer (for non-gpi members).
A simple traffic light system will be in place to monitor compliance and will work accordingly:
-
Green indicates institutions are fully compliant.
-
Orange indicates institutions are not compliant for one week. In the case of an orange indicator, institutions have 12 weeks to reach compliance before being issued a red rating.
-
Red indicates institutions that are not compliant and have missed the 12-week compliance cut off.
Financial institutions that have become ‘red’ lose the possibility to search for their outbound transactions in the Basic Tracker.
Financial institutions always keep their access to the Basic Tracker, even with a ‘red’ status.
For more information about these rules, please visit the Basic Tracker documentation.
Universal Confirmations application provider self-attestation
The Universal Confirmation self-attestation process is dedicated to Swift Registered Providers, who support Universal Confirmations messages.
The applications listed below have been confirmed as ‘Universal Confirmations ready’. Please note that this is an indicative guide only; Swift does not test or audit the product's readiness, resilience, performance, overall quality, usability, scalability, supportability, or other generic commercial features.
For more information on how support will be offered, please reach out to your respective application provider.
If your application provider is not on the list, please share their details with Swift. We will reach out to ensure they are aware of the self-attestation framework and the verifications required to be listed.