JP Morgan Chase announced today that they are launching a request-for-pay (RfP) solution with real-time payments. This solution allows a recipient to send a message to a payer and request payment for an invoice or other obligation. The payer can respond and upon that response, authorize funds to be transferred immediately.
The consumer bill pay market is where many in the industry suspect RfP will take off, but the product Chase is rolling out is focused on the corporate market. Likely because corporates will pay for these transactions where fees are limited in consumer use cases. Here’s an excerpt from the bank’s announcement:
Global payments giant JPMorgan Chase & Co has launched a real-time payments option that it hopes will increase its edge in the financial industry’s battle to handle more of the surging volumes of global digital payments.
“Our job is to give multiple different payment types so corporates and merchants can provide the right options to their customers,” Bhathawalla said.
The service went live last month and began a pilot phase with its first corporate client, a fintech company, last week. Executives declined to name the company.
JPMorgan envisions clients like a gas distributing company using the service to get paid faster for filling up a gas station’s supply tanks, Bhathawalla said.
Currently, that kind of company may have to wait a week to get paid. A digital payment could happen in less than 30 seconds, he said.
One of the first banks to participate in The Clearing House real-time payments network in 2017, JPMorgan processes about 12 million transactions a month. The business is part of the wholesale payments division, which contributes roughly 10% of JPMorgan’s revenue.
Overview by Sarah Grotta, Director, Debit and Alternative Products Advisory Service at Mercator Advisory Group
