I’m calling this a new topic although it seems similar to one previously raised in 2017. At the time an article was shared indicating that the RBA was enabling electronic transfer to be instant between major banks.
Today I transferred $1000 from my Macquarie cash account to a Westpac account. Transfers between these banks have been instant in the past; in fact a transfer McQ to Bendigo yesterday was instant. Not today. The best the call centre people at both banks could tell me was about something called "batching”, where transfers are collected up into a batch before being moved. Westpac told me this could take up to 3 days. Meanwhile where is my money? If my money is in neither account, where is it?
How can I have confidence in banks which are already doing very nicely from assorted fees and charges? And who can I ask about this?
Delays in EFTs has been covered in a number of threads under different topics.
We have struck the same issue with our bank (Suncorp), transferring to external accounts. Some accounts in the external bank are instantaneous using OSKO, while others take 2-3 days.
We were told that OSKO isn’t used when the bank’s assessment algorithms assess the risk of the transfer being higher than usual , such as potential of a transfer to a scammer etc.
I suspect the bank keeps records of external accounts they transfer to, and use this information to assess risks associated with the transfer.
It is somewhere between your account and the recipients account. It could be ready to be batch processed by your bank or in the recipient’s bank waiting to be processed into the recipient’s account. Traditionally batching/processing occurs overnight when their banking systems activity is low. Whether overnight processing is still needed may be questionable when computer speeds/processing capacity is significantly greater than in the past.
There are conspiracies that banks delay transfer to make millions in interest on the short term money markets. Such are conspiracies and are incorrect.
Money in ‘transit’ has little benefit to the banks. They don’t play short term money markets with this money.
Looks like you already have. It is just the way the banking system works.
Macquarie has information about transfer delays here, and appears similar to our bank’s approach:
If you’re making a payment which is higher risk, such as a payment to a new payee, we may delay this payment for 24 hours. Once the delayed payment is released, it should be processed in real time…
When you’re making a payment for the first time to a new payee, we’ll process this payment via direct entry. This means the payment won’t be received by the payee immediately. Pay Anyone payments processed via direct entry are generally received the following Business Day and some cases may take two Business Days.
And yet, I heard it from a banker. Not one of your basic local bankers, but from a fellow I knew who worked for a Japanese bank, playing the money markets. Admittedly this was some 35 years ago. Any large sums were indeed placed into a “batch” and a couple of days of international money market earned them (and him) very tidy sums. He could have been lying, I suppose, but he lived the high life…
If you really want to pursue this then you would have to make a formal complaint to Macquarie that the transfer was not quasi-realtime (as it usually is, via Osko), then get an unsatisfactory response from Macquarie, and then escalate to AFCA.
However if that amount of $1000 is more than the usual amount or is part of a sequence of transfers in a short space of time or for related reasons then it may be that the transaction was legitimately delayed in case the transaction is fraudulent (as @phb wrote) and hence
it is protecting you - giving you a chance to notice that withdrawal and get it reversed before it hits money mule accounts and is spirited out of the country or into cryptocurrency never to be seen again
or in the future if the banks become financially liable when you get defrauded then it is protecting the banks (source and destination) but I don’t like your chances of a successful complaint if such a regulation came into existence in Australia - you will be reaping as others have sewn.
I understand of course that the transaction was not fraudulent and that in fact the Westpac account may even be for the same entity as the Macquarie account but
a) banks can’t really tell that two accounts are for the same entity unless the two accounts are with the same bank, and
b) banks certainly can’t tell whether the transaction is fraudulent - at best, they are guessing and causing legitimate transactions aggravation in the process - welcome to the future.
A point not addressed is the specific statement that transfers between those banks have been instant in the past. It is not clear if it is between the same accounts as in the past, or just the same banks.
What will probably never be known outside Macquarie is what would have ‘tripped’ what should have been an Osko transfer into a batched transfer for a relatively small sum, and it is implied (not known) the customer is not new to Macquarie.
Predictability is important but seemingly can be a random outcome as viewed from an account holder’s perspective.
Such well informed responses! This is a brilliant resource, this community.
As for the OSKO thing – for whatever reason, Macquarie decided against. And the other end, my brief $20 overdrawn crime at Westpac (not notified of course, why would they?!) scored a $30 fine.
When we transfer with Suncorp, it advises at the time of the transfer whether OKSO is available. If it isn’t, it states that the transfer will be received in the recipient’s account within 2 days.
Notwithstanding this, recently we made a purchase by EFT for a new PC, OKSO was available. Immediately after we instigated the transfer, we received notification that the transfer had been picked up as assessed as being high risk, and it would be delayed. This was the notification:
The payment ended up being processed 24 hours later, with the business receiving the funds shortly thereafter.
I am not sure why this particular one was delayed as the business operates nationally, but, it was a new payee for us using EFT - all previous payments were made using cards. I only suspect that this was the reason.
Alternatively it could also be that unauthorised transactions (e.g. someone’s account where criminals had access to make payments) had occurred in the past with this business as a way to launder stolen monies by buying and reselling IT equipment. This might also be a trigger for a higher risk assessment to this particular business. I suppose the delay allows one to cancel the transaction if it was unauthorised before it was lost forever.
While OSKO is available, we have recently taken the approach that all new payee transfers can take up a couple of days - just in case Suncorp holds the payment. This means we make allowance for additional time when setting up EFTs to ensure it is received when required.
That’s a good point - and most likely, already, predictability has been lost.
So if the payment has a hard deadline then allow extra time, as @phb suggests.
This is made explicit with one of my banks. Every time I use a new payee, it requires specific authorisation via RSA key, usually twice, and I assume for most other customers via whatever is their chosen 2FA mechanism. But once it is in the system, there is no further aggravation.
As I’m mostly just paying bills, I haven’t really noticed whether that first time payment is then also delayed, despite having been specifically authorised.
I have the same gripe…my super pension used to be transferred exactly on the 24th of the month. Same bank being used, but since July it takes sometimes up to the26th before it lands in my account. I queried it, the bank says the funds have to be cleared…..
