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PayTo for business. The always-on digital way for businesses to initiate real-time payments from customers’ bank accounts.

Posted on by Marketing Team

The rollout of PayTo capabilities to online banking channels, with Great Southern Bank leading the way, has sharpened focus on ‘how’ and ‘why’ businesses should become initiating participants to enable real-time and future dated payments from their customers’ bank accounts.

In this post we look at how PayTo can help initiating businesses thrive in a digital economy with fast, reliable and secure payments that keeps money moving 24/7.

The case for PayTo

As an enabler of real-time digital commerce, PayTo supports a broad range of use cases, delivering tangible benefits for the initiating business, including:

Explicit customer authorisation before any payments can be processed from bank accounts, addressing one of its biggest payment challenges facing businesses today; the requirement for consent via Strong Customer Authentication to reduce the risk of fraud, unauthorised payments and chargebacks.

Message response times that are delivered in seconds, confirming that valid account details have been provided, that payment has been authorised by the account owner, and that funds are available at time of payment, improving the certainty of successful payment outcomes for the initiating business.

The real-time settlement of funds at time of payment to improve cashflow availability for reinvestment in the business.

From an operational perspective the data-rich ISO messaging capabilities of the NPP enables more precise transaction data to be included within payment initiation and clearing and settlement messages. Data that more accurately describes the terms of the payer customer’s authorisation, including; payment type (recurring, one-off or ad hoc), any ultimate creditor’s name, descriptions and creditor’s reference(s), all support the easier reconciliation of payments. This also provides richer data insights that businesses can use to tailor their products and services to optimise customer experience.

The format of PayTo mandates and the data that can be included offers significant benefits in terms of data quality and visibility, compared to the relatively opaque nature of direct debit arrangements established under the BECS Direct Entry system, particularly if the payment is being facilitated via an intermediary.

Taken individually, each feature of a PayTo mandate improves an aspect of the payment experience. Taken together they can help lower the total cost of payment acceptance for the initiating business.

How to connect to PayTo as a Payment Initiator or Initiating Business

Payment service providers, platforms and payment facilitators that process payments on behalf of other businesses, as well as high volume and high growth businesses that process their own payments, can connect to PayTo as a Payment Initiator through Cuscal, the market leader in NPP. Benefits include:

  • Only one access point required to initiate payments with all financial institutions connected to the NPP.
  • APIs supporting seamless integration and straight-through processes.
  • Structured data capabilities to support automated reconciliation.
  • Centralised, secure storage of PayTo mandates reducing the reputational risk from payments data breeches.

Other businesses can connect to PayTo as an Initiating Business through a Payment Initiator, benefiting from:

  • Real-time account validation when a mandate is created.
  • PayTo authorisation by the account owner through secure bank channels.
  • Real-time funds verification at the time of payment.
  • Real-time notification of payment outcomes.
  • Faster settlement compared to other payment methods.
  • Integration of notifications into customer service and support processes when a PayTo mandate is paused, changed or cancelled.

With PayTo now live in banking channels are you ready to transform your business with PayTo? To find out more about connecting to PayTo as a Payment Initiator, contact Cuscal.

Transform your business with PayTo

Posted on by Marketing Team

Leveraging the data-rich capabilities of the New Payments Platform (NPP), PayTo delivers insight rich, convenient and trusted payment arrangements for merchants, businesses and government agencies, while consumers benefit from having more control and visibility over payments set up from their bank account.

As PayTo commences rolling out to payments service providers and financial institutions over the coming months it is set to modernise the way bank accounts are used for payments, underpinning innovation for years to come in how we pay and get paid. Representing a step change in account-to-account payments, PayTo is much more than just a real-time alternative to direct debit. PayTo streamlines in-app payments, card-on-file arrangements, funding for digital wallet and buy-now-pay-later services and recurring e-commerce payments.

Accessing PayTo

Payments service providers, fintech and enterprise interested in initiating payments themselves, or on behalf of another third-party, can connect to PayTo via Cuscal. As a market leader in the NPP, Cuscal has the scale, experience, technical knowledge and trusted industry position to help payments service providers, fintech and enterprise compete and succeed with PayTo.

Merchants, businesses and government agencies interested in offering PayTo as a payment option for customers can now access PayTo services through a payments service provider connected to the Platform. Some of the leading innovators on the Platform today have integrated with PayTo through Cuscal’s Payment Initiator Service, building on top of our service to bring to life new innovative PayTo propositions.

Azupay

Established in 2019, Azupay is an Australian fintech focused on payment solutions using the New Payments Platform (NPP) technology, specialising in real-time payments using NPP and PayID to help government, business and consumers pay and get paid faster. www.azupay.com.au

Eway

Eway is a global omnichannel payment provider, processing ecommerce payments for merchants through a secure and reliable online payment gateway that makes it easy to accept payments from anyone, anywhere, from any device. www.eway.com.au

Ezidebit

Ezidebit is one of Australia’s leading online payment solution provider specialising in securely collecting Direct Debit, BPAY, EFTPOS and real-time payments for businesses. www.ezidebit.com

Ezypay

As one of Australia’s leading subscription payment providers, Ezypay offers a suite of easy-to-use subscription management services through their cloud-based payment platform, making it easy for businesses to settle payments and generate revenue through a standalone web interface, or directly integrated into a range of industry specific partner platforms. www.ezypay.com.au

GoCardless

GoCardless is a global leader in account-to-account payments, helping businesses accelerate the collection and management of recurring and one-off payments directly from customers’ bank accounts. With a global payments network and technology platform, GoCardless processes US$30 billion of payments for 65,000 businesses across more than 30 countries every year. www.gocardless.com

Monoova

Monoova supports scaling businesses with large, and often complex, ongoing transaction flows to fully automate how they receive, manage, pay and request payment of funds through one simple API integration. Its proprietary platform allows businesses to access a variety of payments functions, comprehensive reconciliation and reporting options and entirely customised real-time data. www.monoova.com

Paypa Plane

Australian fintech Paypa Plane helps banks and PSPs rapidly evolve product offerings without changing existing infrastructure through it’s simple ‘plug-in’ over the top bank-grade platform and white-label solutions, helping banks and PSPs create closer, more valuable and long term relationships with their small and medium business customers. www.paypaplane.com

Zai

Zai helps mid-market and enterprise-level business customers in the world of integrated financial services automate complex payment workflows and reconcile pay ins and payouts, helping them operate more effectively by saving time and money so they can scale and grow. www.hellozai.com

Cuscal enabling PayTo for financial institutions, payments service providers, fintechs and enterprise

Posted on by Marketing Team

Sydney, 30 June 2022

Following the announcement that NPP Australia has opened access to PayTo for the first payments service providers, Cuscal announced today it is enabling 45 financial institutions and payment services providers with access to PayTo as rollout commences over the coming months.

Cuscal was one of the founding financial institutions that established the New Payments Platform (NPP), Australia’s real-time payment system, and enabled over 60% of the financial institutions that were live on Day 1.

Since that time, Cuscal has strengthened its position as the market leader in NPP services, building a strong foundation of clients, industry relationships, expertise and scale over the last five years.

Cuscal currently:

  • Provides access to the NPP for over half of all financial institutions and payment service providers on the platform that offer real time payments to their customers
  • Processes 18% of payments made and 19% of payments received on the NPP

Cuscal is working closely with a large group of banks, payments service providers and software providers to support the ramp up of PayTo over the next few months. Cuscal’s PayTo development and implementation project has included many financial institutions and PSPs who wish to drive payment innovation and improved customer experiences using PayTo.

Bianca Bates, Chief Client Officer and Deputy CEO, Cuscal Limited, said:

Cuscal is able to support a wide range of capabilities. We are about enabling competition. We provide services that let our clients innovate and develop their businesses. It has been a rewarding process to work with our financial institution and payment service provider clients to enable them to be the early adopters for PayTo.

The first group of financial institutions and payment service providers integrating with PayTo through Cuscal will go-live between July and September, followed by fast followers between October and December. The gradual ramp up of PayTo is expected to be completed in 2023 with full industry adoption.

Cuscal’s NPP infrastructure, scalable solution design and modular API services have made it possible for both existing and new clients who are focused on investing in innovation for their customers, to extend their NPP services to access PayTo, ensuring they are at the forefront of future payments innovation across subscription and bill payments, ecommerce and in app transactions, embedded finance and account funding, and the bulk disbursement of funds.

Cuscal has also partnered with software providers to ensure that Cuscal’s NPP Payments and PayTo services are integrated seamlessly into all clients’ digital channels to deliver an optimum customer experience.

Cuscal’s expertise and scale has also attracted clients who are nimble, innovative and focused to take advantage of one seamless onboarding to enable them to be first to market with Cuscal’s NPP Payments and PayTo services.

James Foster, Chief Executive Officer, Ezypay, commented:

We chose to partner with Cuscal as we knew they could deliver on our requirements to be live with PayTo on Day 1. We are a leading subscription payments fintech and it’s comforting to know that Cuscal’s vision for the future of payments in Australia is strongly aligned with ours.

For more information about Cuscal’s PayTo initiation services, click here.

Payment Services Providers – initiating PayTo payments for businesses

  1. Azupay
  2. Ezypay
  3. Global Payments (Eway, Ezidebit)
  4. GoCardless
  5. Hay Limited
  6. Merchant Warrior
  7. Monoova
  8. Paypa Plane
  9. Zai (formerly Assembly Payments)

Payer Financial Institutions – making PayTo payments for customers

  1. Australian Mutual Bank
  2. Australian Unity Bank
  3. Bank Australia
  4. Bank of Queensland (BOQ and Virgin Money)
  5. Bank WAW
  6. bcu
  7. Bendigo Bank
  8. Beyond Bank
  9. Central Murray Credit Union
  10. Community First Credit Union
  11. Credit Union SA
  12. Defence Bank
  13. First Option Bank
  14. Geelong Bank
  15. Goulburn Murray Credit Union
  16. Hay Limited
  17. Horizon Bank
  18. Illawarra Credit Union
  19. Laboratories Credit Union
  20. Great Southern Bank
  21. MyState Bank
  22. Northern Inland Credit Union
  23. Orange Credit Union
  24. P&N Bank
  25. People’s Choice
  26. Police Credit Union
  27. Queensland Country Bank
  28. RACQ Bank
  29. Regional Australia Bank
  30. South West Slopes Credit Union
  31. Teachers Mutual Bank Limited (Teachers Mutual Bank, Firefighters Mutual Bank, Health Professionals Bank, Hiver and UniBank)
  32. The Broken Hill Community Credit Union
  33. The Mac
  34. ubank (formerly 86400)
  35. Unity Bank Limited (Unity Bank and Reliance Bank)
  36. Warwick Credit Union

Media contact

Simone Perryman, SShields@cuscal.com.au

NPP and PayTo SAM Network webinar

Posted on by Marketing Team

NPP’s PayTo will be a new, digital way for merchants and businesses to initiate real-time payments from their customers’ bank accounts while allowing customers to see and control all recurring payments through their account. With the introduction of PayTo from mid-2022 all financial institutions that offer customer-initiated real-time payments will need to make significant changes to their back-office processes and technology in order to support receiving and actioning PayTo messages and payment initiation requests.

Ben Vivoda, Head of Client Services and Nathan Churchward, Head of Product Emerging Services, from Cuscal met virtually with members of the SAM Network to discuss this next phase of the NPP and the opportunities that PayTo will create.

Webinar: ‘SAM Network webinar: The NPP and PayTo’

Partnership in action. Monoova and the NPP

Posted on by Marketing Team

When the New Payments Platform (NPP) rolled out on Tuesday, 13 February 2018 uptake was gradual as financial institutions rolled out NPP payment functionality to different customer segments and channels. However, as real-time payments have become more ubiquitous and innovative payment service providers have been enabled on the NPP, the growth trajectory of the platform has gone from strength-to-strength.

As one of a very small group of payment service providers to be enabled on the NPP, payment automation specialist Monoova recognised the potential of the platform early, partnering with Cuscal to access the platform and automate many of the manual processes that occur ‘before’, ‘after’ or ‘around’ payments which can be an obstacle to growth for scaling businesses.

From mid-2022 the next phase of growth for the platform commences with the launch of PayTo, enabling a broad range of use-cases which will provide a springboard for future payments innovation. Once again Monoova will be at the forefront of NPP-enabled innovation, with Monoova’s clients to be amongst the first in Australia to be able to initiate payments from a funding account with the payer customer’s authorisation.

This case study looks at how Monoova has innovated on top of Cuscal’s NPP and PayTo solutions to bring to life truly unique propositions that make managing business payments easy, providing clients with access to a true end-to-end payment automation solution that leverages all the capabilities of the NPP as well as Cuscal’s scale, expertise and trusted industry position to initiate, process and receive real-time payments.

Beyond real-time: the value of pre-authorised payments from bank accounts

Posted on by Marketing Team

The face of payments in Australia has changed dramatically over the last twenty to thirty years, with the pace of change set to accelerate as technological advancements revolutionise the way we make, receive and request payments.

As the most frequently requested capability for the New Payments Platform (NPP), enabling the capabilities required to support third-party payment initiation from bank accounts has been a key priority for the payments and banking industry. Known as PayTo, this service will leverage the infrastructure of the NPP to drive the next phase of growth for the Platform.

PayTo will lead the use of embedded, pre-authorised payments from bank accounts in Australia, supporting a diverse range of payment use cases. It will provide consumers and businesses greater confidence, certainty and control over account-to-account payments as they are moved seamlessly into the background.

While PayTo will be available from mid-2022, when shifts in payment technology occur you want to be at the front of the queue to gain a first mover advantage over competitors. To help payment service providers and enterprises plan for the introduction of PayTo this white paper looks at:

  • The origins of real-time payments in Australia and the future directions for the NPP;
  • The rapid uptake of payment initiation in the UK under Open Banking;
  • The value PayTo will deliver to consumers and businesses and what the user journey looks like from the end-user perspective;
  • The role different participants play in the PayTo ecosystem; and
  • What Cuscal is doing to enable the PayTo services that are required by payer banks and payment initiators.

Format: White paper
Audience: Payment service providers and enterprises that process a large volume of payments
Estimated reading time: 20 minutes

Unlocking opportunities in the era of open data and payments

Posted on by Marketing Team

Under the government’s Digital Economy Strategy Australia is set to become “a leading digital economy and society by 2030”, with the Consumer Data Right (CDR) one of several initiatives designed to establish the right foundations to grow the digital economy.

Integrated data and technologies will make life easier for consumers and businesses, but enterprises face the challenges integrating legacy systems and infrastructure with real-time digital ecosystems. Cuscal can help enterprises bridge this gap, deploying new capabilities that support the collection, sharing, management and storage of consumer consent and CDR data. While our position at the centre of payments – as the leading provider of New Payment Platform (NPP) payment services to banks and payment service providers – means we are ideally positioned to help enterprises unlock new growth opportunities from the convergence of data and payment initiation services.

This white paper provides senior leaders and product owners with insights into some of the regulatory, technology, security and capabilities required to comply with the CDR today and how to unlock opportunities from the convergence of data and payments.

In this white paper you’ll learn more about:

  • What the CDR is, how it has evolved and what future legislative change may mean for Data Holders in designated industries, as well as for accredited Data Recipients;
  • How NPP capabilities are being enhanced and extended through the development of the PayTo service, supporting ‘write’ access for third party payment initiation from bank accounts in real-time, as envisaged under CDR;
  • What enterprises should consider to enable data-centric strategies that integrate with the CDR and real-time payments, and how Cuscal capabilities and payment expertise can facilitate participation across ecosystems;
  • Use cases demonstrating some of the ways in which the CDR and payment initiation can be applied to make life easier for consumers and businesses;
  • How Cuscal is assisting clients participate in the CDR with access to a suite of secure and robust capabilities for the collection, sharing, management and storage of data subject to CDR legislation; and
  • How Cuscal is enabling payment initiation services that are align with CDR and NPP PayTo frameworks for banks, payment service providers, fintechs and enterprises.

If you’d like to know more about how Cuscal can support your business participate in the CDR ecosystem and with real-time PayTo payment initiation, call 1300 650 501 or submit an enquiry.

Download the White Paper [PDF, 10 MB]

The NPP is starting to realise its potential

Posted on by Marketing Team

We have been thrilled by the reaction to the recent article which broke the news about the New Payments Platform (NPP) collaboration between Cuscal and Assembly Payments. We’ve both been fielding lots of enquiries from companies keen to emulate Carsales and so we thought we’d write this article to tell you a bit more about how the collaboration works and the best way to bring the benefits of real-time payments to your customers.

We think the NPP is a fantastic opportunity for any e-commerce company that is sending large amounts of money around or just needs to move money fast. Whether this is large volumes of transactions (or just large transactions) the benefits are clear – immediate, verified payments with detailed descriptions will enhance customer experience and minimise enquiries.

What is the NPP and how do you connect?
The NPP is the new, decentralised payments infrastructure which allows participating financial institutions (including Cuscal and the RBA) to move money between each other in seconds, 24/7. To become part of the infrastructure (a ‘Participant’) is a lengthy, complex process and you are required to be an Authorised Deposit-taking Institution (as it’s a regulated environment and requires access to RBA settlement facilities). However, most companies don’t need to do this. They can get the same benefits, more cheaply and easily by connecting to one of the Participants.

What levels of connection and capability are there?
The second official level of connection to the NPP is called an ‘Identified Institution’. The collaboration between Cuscal and Assembly Payments is big news because Assembly is the first company that is NOT a financial institution to be officially recognised as an Identified Institution. This means Assembly can register and create PayIDs for others and offer NPP services to its own customers, like Carsales.

Complicated? It doesn’t have to be.
While the background, and some of the terms, are a bit complicated, actually using the NPP is getting easier. Most companies will connect through APIs. The New Payments Platform has recently published its API framework which enables third parties to get a greater understanding of the platform and what it can do, using a sample API Sandbox.

Each NPP Participant will support their own APIs based on the NPP API Framework. Cuscal has already released REST APIs, which is how Assembly accesses NPP and Osko services to move money in real-time between Cuscal and other financial institutions.

Using the NPP is even quicker and easier for those companies that don’t need to become an NPP Identified Institution but want the benefits that come with NPP and Osko payments. For example, Carsales is enabled for NPP services through the Assembly platform.

Which path is right for you?
It depends on what you want to do.

  • Talk to Cuscal if you want to become an Identified Institution, like Assembly, and offer PayIDs and NPP services to your own customers. This path will suit businesses such as financial institutions and payment service providers.
  • Talk to Assembly if you would like a full suite of multi-channel payment solutions including real time NPP payments, PayIDs, underwriting, fraud and KYC services. This path will suit many online businesses, especially corporate enterprises, marketplaces and ecommerce platforms.

If you’re confused as to which path is right for you, just get in touch with either one of us and we’ll steer you in the right direction!

By Nathan Churchward, Cuscal and Simon Lee, Assembly Payments

Unlocking the potential of real-time payment

Posted on by Marketing Team


A discussion on unlocking the potential of real-time payments with Adrian Lovney (NPPA), John Banfield (BPAY), our own Nathan Churchward & Phillip Finnegan (ACI Worldwide) at Curious Thinkers 2018 in Sydney.

Watch the video to see the panel discussion into the potential of real-time payments, as well as covering the competitive landscape, fraud and NPP access.

Faster Payments, Richer Data with Adrian

Posted on by Marketing Team


Adrian Lovney, CEO, NPPA at Curious Thinkers 2018 in Sydney providing Cuscal’s clients with information about faster payments and richer data.

Watch the video to learn the current status of the New Payments Platform as well as its plans and priorities for the future. Adrian delves into the NPP’s API plans and its ‘consent and mandate’ service which will lay the groundwork for servicing direct debits as well as the second phase of Osko ‘request to pay’.