Instant Payments Services

  • The fastest and safest way o transfer money – the payments via Instant payments are interbank transfers processed by TRANSFOND, with the settlement ensured by the National Bank of Romania. TRANSFOND is the operator of Instant payments interbank infrastructure. This is the company that processes all non-card retail interbanking payments (below 50.000_lei) in Romania. In the Instant payments system, money is directly transferred from the debtor’s bank account to the beneficiary’s bank account, without passing through intermediate accounts. Instant Payments is a component of the Automated Clearing House – SENT.
  • Your money will be safe the Instant Payments infrastructure belongs to the banks, thus guaranteeing the safety of your money, information enclosed to the payments and the entire system. The National Bank of Romania is the overseer of the system, according to all relevant legal provisions.
  • You will become independent from the regular business hours and you are able to send or collect money anytime, as your bank will provide this 24/7 service.
  • In addition to Instant Payments, TRANSFOND completed, in September 2020, the development of AliasPay - a service which offers the possibility of simplified initiation of payments between two accounts opened with different banks, using only the mobile phone number of the payment beneficiary. AliasPay is a Standardized Proxy Lookup (SPL) service that allows payments initiation based on an alias (mobile phone number) that the payer knows. AliasPay connects the IBAN account number of the payee to the alias, for payment service providers. In implementing the service, TRANSFOND used the SPL scheme of the Romanian Association of Banks.
  • TRANSFOND developed and completed the technical application (October 2017), conducted the internal testing (November 2017 – February 2018), coordinated the testing with the banks (February 2018 – opening of the test medium for banks) and the commissioning of the service took place in the second semester of 2018, with the successful conclusion of the tests conducted by the banks.
    • Starting April 22, 2019, the first partners in offering the service were Banca Transilvania and CEC Bank. 
    • Libra Internet Bank joined the instant payments infrastructure in november 2019.
    • Banca Comercială Română operationalized the service on January 30, 2020.
    • Starting August 9, 2021, Vista Bank became the fifth bank to offer Instant Payments to it's customers.
    • On December 2, 2021, Patria Bank started offering Instant Payments to its customers.
    • On September 7, 2022 Raiffeisen Bank launched Instant Payments services.
    • Starting September 12, 2022, BRD Groupe Societe Generale became the 8th bank to join the Instant Payments infrastructure.
    • On October 6, 2022, Intesa Sanpaolo Bank added to its portfolio of services - the Instant Payments service.
    • Starting March 20, 2023, ING Bank Romania is enriching its portfolio of innovative payment services with the Instant Payments service, developed by TRANSFOND.
    • Alpha Bank successfully operationalized the service on November 13, 2023.
    • On February 20, 2024, Salt Bank joined the banks that offer the Instant Payments service.
    • Starting from June 17, 2024, BRCI is enriching its portfolio of innovative payment services with the Instant Payments service.
    • TechVentures Bank joined the instant payments infrastructure on 16 July 2024.
    • On October 1, 2024, First Bank started offering Instant Payments to its customers.
    • Starting November 15th, 2024, Unicredit Bank and Smith & Smith joined Instant Payments.

Entities involved in the Instant Payment System

  • Banks (payment services providers), 

  • End-users,

  • Retailers, 

  • Payment schemes administrator – ARB, 

  • Payment schemes supervisor – NBR.

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