ICICI Bank to offer instant facility for cross-border inward remittances

The bank also stated that in order to send instant remittances to India, non-residents can visit their bank overseas and initiate remittance transaction via ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’.

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ICICI Bank on June 2 announced that it has tied up with SWIFT to offer instant facility for cross-border inward remittances.

This facility will help overseas partner banks to send instant remittances on behalf of their customers to the beneficiary in India, thus making ICICI Bank first lender in Asia-Pacific and the second globally to offer the facility, called ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’, for cross border inward payments.

The service that offers instant credit works by connecting ‘SWIFT gpi’, the high-speed cross-border rails with a real-time domestic payments infrastructure.

The bank has enabled its systems to process the payments message coming via ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’ and further remit it instantly to any bank (bank enabled to receive foreign remittance through IMPS) account in India using the IMPS (Immediate Payment Solution) platform.

The solution makes the cross-border personal remittances up to Rs 2 lakh coming into India, transparent, reliable and instant and thereby reducing the turnaround time significantly from the industry practice of at least few hours, the bank said.

Sriram H. Iyer, Head – International Banking Group of ICICI Bank said, “India is the largest recipient of cross-border remittances, according to the World Bank data, and ICICI Bank has been a dominant player in inward remittances to India. This integration with the SWIFT platform brings in the convenience of almost instant and seamless cross-border remittances."

“The inward remittance message received by ICICI Bank on ‘Swift gpi Instant’ is instantly processed, can be tracked end-to-end and the sender gets complete clarity on the receipt of funds by the beneficiary,” he further added.

Kiran Shetty, CEO & Regional Head, India & South Asia, SWIFT said, “As the world is increasingly becoming real-time, ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’ is an important milestone for our strategic ambition to help banks and their clients meet the growing global demand for instant and frictionless cross-border transfers. We look forward to continuing our work with market infrastructures and leading financial institutions like ICICI Bank to bring benefits of seamless cross-border payments to customers, driving financial inclusion in this part of the world.”

Below are the key benefits of ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’:

• Instant transfer: Personal remittances of up to Rs 2 lakh sent through ‘SWIFT gpi Instant’ are processed instantly and credited into the beneficiary account held with any bank* in India, via the IMPS network. (*bank to be enabled to receive foreign remittance through IMPS)
• Available 24X7 and 365 days: The service is available 24X7.
• Transparency on the charges: The details about the charges levied by intermediary banks are updated on the ‘SWIFT gpi’ platform; it gives the sender complete clarity on charges.
• Immediate update on status of the transfers: The ‘SWIFT gpi’ platform provides end-to-end tracking of payments from initiation till fulfillment through instant automated status update.