Dear Members:

It’s long been part of Corporate One’s mission to help our members succeed by offering reliable and efficient payment solutions. Through our participation over the last five years on The Clearing House’s (TCH) RTP Advisory and Business Committees, Federal Reserve committees, and as the first credit union on the U.S. Faster Payments Council, we’ve witnessed the rapid evolution of the payment ecosystem. We recognize that real-time payments are not only the future of the industry, but they also represent tremendous opportunities for credit unions to enhance member service, streamline business functions, and generate new products and revenue.

For example, with real-time payments, your credit union can:

• Address the gaps in current payment methods through speed, security, value-added messaging capabilities, and immediate availability of transaction status.
• Support a variety of use cases, including consumer and business payments, to remain competitive and be in the best position to support your members’ needs.
• Offer flexible design with innovative capabilities and unique functionality not just constrained to payments. RTPs can also support additional capabilities beyond the transfer of funds (i.e., non-payment messages, such as request for payment and payment confirmation).
• Meet your members’ (and the industry’s) demand for faster payments.

Much of the financial services industry has already shifted toward real-time payments. Since TCH launched the RTP^® network in 2017, the first new payment network in 40 years, nearly 60% of demand deposit accounts (DDAs) in the U.S. are already connected to it, meaning they can at least receive payments via this new payment rail. And an additional 10-20 banks onboard every week. Unfortunately, there are currently fewer than 25 credit unions leveraging RTP, which underscores how important it is for credit unions to adopt and take advantage of this payment method.

Just as we’ve witnessed with the introduction of previous payment options, such as ACH, credit unions are going to need to evolve their payment infrastructure to remain competitive. And, at the very minimum for real-time payments, that means positioning your credit union to be able to at least receive payments. Real-time payments provide great opportunity, but like ACH, credit/debit, there are levels of complexity. Fortunately, as your credit union learns about and experiences immediate payments, you will learn what is most valuable to your specific credit union.

If you haven’t already done so, I invite you to visit our Real-Time Payments Info Center. We have a comprehensive array of educational resources that cover a variety of topics – everything from the differences between faster payments and real-time payments to specific business cases your credit union can implement right now. In addition, Corporate One and our CUSO, Sherpa Technologies, have spent a lot of time building our capabilities to meet the needs credit unions have for real-time payments, and we stand ready to help you wherever you are in your strategy. We are happy to consult with you or talk to you about solutions for managing your cash or accessing the network in an RTP Discovery Meeting.

We believe it is critical that credit unions put real-time payments on their strategic roadmaps in order to remain competitive in the rapidly changing payments landscape. Please feel free to reach out to me, any member of our Enterprise Leadership Team, or Sherpa’s President/CEO Keith Riddle with any questions you might have.

Best,