John, a loyal customer of the Bank of Ireland for over three decades, recently contacted us expressing his frustration over the bank’s sluggish services. John points out the irony in the bank’s online banking service being called ‘365’, suggesting it be renamed ‘248’ to reflect the exclusion of weekends and bank holidays, as well as the service’s limited operating times, which only span the usual 9 to 5 office hours.
John remarks about the Bank of Ireland’s brand ‘Banking 365’, a name it uses specifically for its online and telephone services. His concerns arose from a recent incident wherein he attempted to transfer €2,000 from a current account under his name to his Bank of Ireland-issued credit card, which was nearing its limit. He emphasises that it was a straightforward transfer, with no foreign bank cheques involved; simply moving funds from a Bank of Ireland account to another. He initially anticipated that this procedure, between two sectors of the same bank utilising identical IT systems, would take between 10 to 15 seconds.
However, to his astonishment, it took a significant 80 hours after his instruction for the transfer to be completed, during which time two of his payments were declined. This, he argues, contradicts the bank’s round-the-clock ability to refuse credit card transactions, a service that continues to operate through weekends and holidays. He also notes that the bank’s support service was unhelpful in alleviating his concerns about this delay.
Recently, several questions have arisen about delays in financial transactions within the Irish banking system, specifically regarding the Bank of Ireland system. One instance was earlier in the month when a customer was puzzled by a delay in movements of funds between Irish banks due to a European public holiday on May Day; a day that isn’t observed as a holiday in Ireland. On May 1st, the customer was expecting to receive and send out payments, neither of which happened.
The Bank of Ireland notified customers on May Day that even though it was operating as usual, various banks across Europe were closed due to the workers’ holiday. A question emerged about why a money transfer between two Irish banks could be postponed for a day because banks in countries like France and Germany were not in service on the mentioned day.
Furthermore, given the digital nature of these transactions and the apparent lack of human involvement, the customer wondered why transactions occurring outside working hours are postponed. Does the machinery responsible for money movements ever take breaks on the weekends?
In response to the first enquiry, a representative from Bank of Ireland stated that any intra-bank or SEPA payments made after the Friday cut-off time of 3:30pm are carried out on the subsequent working day. Once executed, it may take about 24 hours (excluding weekends or bank holidays) for the funds to reach credit card accounts, and if a credit card lacks funds, the transaction will be automatically declined.
In addition, the bank provided a detailed answer to the secondary query. It explained that non-domestic as well as domestic payments are processed using European payments schemes (EBA clearing) by the Bank of Ireland and other Irish banks. The European May Day holiday this year fell on Wednesday, May 1st, and European institutions such as the European Central Bank, which manages the banking settlement system across Europe, were closed. Consequently, electronic payments in Euro couldn’t be performed to bank accounts in Ireland or throughout Europe.
The reason why it seems like computers take a lengthy period to complete transactions, much more time than expected, is explained in the following statement:
“Irish banks, amongst others in Europe, use the European payment schemes (EBA clearing) for the transfer of funds between domestic and international banks. These payment systems operate with a pre-determined schedule of Monday to Friday. They enable the transaction of payments between banks through a primary exchange during set cycles in the working day. Consequently, there are specific cut-off times that banks partaking in the scheme are required to strictly follow every day. Depending on the timing of a payment, it could either reach the recipient’s account on the same day or maximally by the next day.”
Fortunately, the delay associated with this process will soon become a thing of the past. The European Union is slated to launch the SEPA Instant Payment Scheme in 2025. Under this new system, payments will be transferred and received within a small 10-second bracket, operating every day of the week. This change will undoubtedly revolutionise our transactions experience.