The vision for account-to-account payments in Australia

A2A vision > Vision for A2A payments

2 Vision for A2A payments 

2.1 A2A payments vision  

A trusted A2A payments system that meets the evolving needs of consumers, businesses and government agencies, supporting resilience, competition, innovation and productivity in the Australian economy. 

2.2 Purpose  

A2A payments are foundational to Australia’s economy. Australian consumers, businesses and government agencies (collectively referred to as ‘end-users’) rely on A2A payments every day for their financial activities, including the payment of wages, superannuation, welfare, bills and taxes, transferring money to family and friends, receiving dividends and making investments. Modern capabilities and services and changing customer behaviour are further expanding the use of A2A payments into new contexts, such as in-store, online, in-app purchases and other digital commerce environments.    

The A2A payments vision defines the desired future state for A2A payments in Australia. It provides clarity and certainty on the long-term strategic direction for A2A payments by articulating the end-user objectives and the system characteristics required to deliver on those end-user objectives.  

The A2A payments vision will anchor the future development of A2A products, services and underlying infrastructure. It will guide industry and public-sector decision-making on prioritisation and sequencing of investments that will deliver on end-user expectations and support Australia’s digital economy. As the system transitions from current state to the desired future state, the A2A payments vision will facilitate ongoing alignment between industry, regulators and end-users by serving as an enduring reference point for years to come.

2.3 Strategic context   

The A2A payments vision is being developed at a time of significant change across Australia’s payments ecosystem. Advances in digital technologies, automation, data exchange and identity frameworks are changing how payments are initiated, authorised and integrated into broader economic activity. At the same time, increasing fraud and cyber threats, growing reliance on digital infrastructure and heightened expectations for operational resilience are creating a more complex operating environment.

Expectations of payments are also evolving. Consumers, businesses and government agencies increasingly expect payments to be faster, more transparent and easier to integrate into digital processes. Expectations are increasingly extending beyond just the movement of funds to encompass the quality of data, automation, security and end-to-end user experience associated with payments.

Governments internationally are increasingly treating payments, identity and data exchange as foundational components of modern digital infrastructure¹. In Australia, initiatives across payments, digital identity, data sharing and competition policy are contributing to a broader agenda focused on productivity, resilience, innovation and economic participation. Policymakers and industry participants are also exploring the implications of emerging technologies, including tokenisation, programmable transactions, new forms of digital money and alternative settlement models. Initiatives such as Project Acacia are helping to assess how these developments may interact with Australia’s future financial infrastructure and existing payments ecosystem.²

As these developments accelerate, the challenge is shifting from the development of payments infrastructure itself towards ensuring that infrastructure is adopted effectively and remains adaptable, resilient to disruptions and capable of supporting future needs.

The A2A payments vision is intended to respond to these developments by providing a shared view of the future role of A2A payments and the capabilities, characteristics and coordination required to support Australia’s evolving economic and public policy objectives. It is focused on identifying the critical foundational building blocks that need to be put in place in the near term, to ensure the A2A payments system is fit for purpose into the future. It also aims to inform, and be informed by, broader work relating to the future of Australia’s payments system, including the Australian Government’s vision for financial innovation, tokenisation and payments reform to support regulatory coordination, industry adoption and the productivity agenda. This will ensure that industry and public policy priorities remain aligned and mutually reinforcing over time. 

2.4 Scope     

A2A payments involve the transfer of funds between accounts held at authorised institutions³ and exhibit one or more of the following characteristics: 

1. They are initiated either by the payer (a credit payment, such as an individual making a payment to another individual), by the payee (a debit payment, such as a business deducting a monthly membership fee from a customer’s bank account), or by a third party acting on behalf of the payer or payee under an agreed authorisation or mandate.  
2. They can be executed as a single payment (for example, a one-off funds transfer by one individual to another) or as multiple payments (for example, a business paying its employees' wages in a batch payment instruction).
3. They can be a one-off payment or set up as a recurring payment at regular intervals such as weekly, monthly or annually. 
4. They can be authorised to occur immediately or scheduled to occur on a future date.  
5. They can be instant, with the payee credited in near real-time, or take longer, with the payee credited some time after the payment is sent. 

How value is transferred through the A2A payments system 

In scope:

• End users - who initiates payments: consumers, businesses, government agencies
• Method of payment: Account-to-account (direct bank to bank payments)
• Channel interface – where payment is initiated: branch, business software, telephone, mobile, online, API and digital wallets. API and digital wallets may support both account-to-account and card payments, and therefore are partially in-scope. 
• Payment service providers - payment provider processes request: bank or other payment service providers)  
• Clearing - payment instructions are exchanged and validated: BECS, HVCS, NPP
• Settlement - money moves between financial institutions: Reserve Bank Information and Transfer System  

Out of scope:

• Channel interface – where payment is initiated: debit card
• Clearing – payment instructions are exchanged and validated: eftpos, Mastercard  

A2A payments are typically initiated by end-users through online banking or mobile banking environments provided by banks, credit unions and other payment service providers (PSPs).

Business and government users may initiate A2A payments through third-party interfaces, such as their accounting, payroll or enterprise resource planning software. These systems play an important role in the creation, authorisation, enrichment and transmission of payment instructions, and therefore influence payment quality, safety, traceability and operational efficiency. Technological advancement is enabling software agents to act on behalf of consumers and businesses, embedding payments directly into commerce, financial management and service delivery processes.  

Payments are currently cleared through one of three clearing streams – BECS, HVCS, and NPP – with the movement of funds between the paying and receiving financial institutions settled through the RBA. Over time, the underlying payments clearing and settlement infrastructure may evolve to incorporate new mechanisms enabled by emerging digital technologies.

BPAY is a specific A2A bill payment solution which enables bill payments to be initiated through online banking or mobile banking environments. Whilst BPAY has its own unique clearing arrangements, it is being considered as predominantly a product proposition for the purposes of the A2A payments vision.  

The scope of this A2A payments vision encompasses the end-to-end A2A payments system described above, with the following exclusions:

• Debit cards, which enable the movement of funds between accounts at authorised institutions and run on three major networks – eftpos (the domestic debit scheme) and the international debit schemes of Visa and Mastercard. These cards are primarily used to make payments for in-store, online and in-app purchases. Debit cards can provide an alternative mechanism for making certain A2A payments, either on an ongoing basis (e.g. recurring card payments as an alternative to direct debits) or potentially as a temporary contingency measure. However, debit card schemes operate under distinct economic and operational frameworks and are therefore excluded from the scope of the A2A payments vision. The A2A payments vision may nevertheless serve as a useful reference point for the future direction of the debit card system with respect to the development of modern A2A products, services and infrastructure.  
• Payments made by cheques, as they are covered by the government’s Cheques Transition Plan⁴ which sets out the next steps to winding down Australia’s chequing system by 2030.  
• Cross-border payments, as they are centrally covered by the G20 Roadmap for Enhancing Cross-border Payments⁵, endorsed by Australia in 2020. The A2A payments vision only has direct relevance to the domestic Australian dollar leg of outbound and inbound cross-border payments, which are processed by payments provider across local payments infrastructure in Australia.
• Payments made with physical cash. 

2.5 Guiding principles  

Six guiding principles underpin the development of the A2A payments vision.

The A2A payments vision should:  

1. Enable a shared and consistent understanding across all stakeholders of the desired future state for A2A payments, providing clarity and minimising ambiguity or misinterpretation.
2. Support Australia’s national interest, with the A2A payments system recognised as a critical national asset that supports Australia’s economic resilience, productivity and global competitiveness, including through appropriate alignment with international standards and developments.  
3. Be aligned to the public interest by being firmly anchored in the desired objectives and outcomes for end-users, encompassing consumers, businesses and government agencies.
4. Be technology-neutral and not bound to any specific A2A payments infrastructure, scheme, product or solution, allowing system-wide benefits to be realised across existing, emerging or future technologies. 
5. Be practical and actionable by providing clear direction to banks, payment service providers, schemes and other participants on the end-user objectives and system characteristics that their products, services and infrastructure support or enable, with delivery of the A2A payments vision to be achieved through an A2A payments roadmap.  
6. Be enduring over time, with stable end-user objectives that can be delivered through system characteristics that evolve or adapt according to changing economic conditions, emerging risks and technological innovation without needing significant redesign. 

[1] OECD (2024), “Digital public infrastructure for digital governments”, OECD Public Governance Policy Papers, No. 68, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://doi.org/10.1787/ff525dc8-en.

[2] RBA (2026), “Project Acacia – Exploring the role of digital money in wholesale tokenised asset markets”

[3] Currently this is an Authorised Deposit-Taking Institution (ADI), including Purchased Payment Facilities (PPF), but may include non-ADIs in the future.

[4] https://treasury.gov.au/publication/p2024-555854 

[5] https://www.fsb.org/uploads/P131020-1.pdf