Faster banking delayed
The introduction of a system that will deliver faster banking and enable same-day money transfers over the phone and internet has been put back until next May. The scheme, which will allow payments to be made in a matter of hours, was due to start in November, but the Association of Payment Clearing Services (Apacs) has had to delay the project, blaming the complexity of the task in hand. Paul Smee, Apacs chief executive, said: "The UK banking industry is disappointed that we won't be able to deliver the new faster payments system as quickly as we had planned, but there is no room for error when launching a system which forms part of the UK's economic infrastructure. "Clearly, it is more important to make sure it is done with our total confidence than rushed to meet a self-imposed delivery date." The banking industry is shelling out around £300m on developing the project, after coming up for criticism from the Office of Fair Trading for the length of time it take to process electronic payments.
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