BI-FAST Inaugurated, Interbank Transfer Fees Drop to Rp2.500

One by one the implementation of the Indonesia Payment System Blueprint (BSPI) 2025 began to be realized. Bank Indonesia finally inaugurated BI Fast Payment (BI-FAST) which allows interbank transfers for only Rp. 2.500.

BI-FAST is a payment system infrastructure provided by Bank Indonesia that can be accessed through applications provided by the payment system industry to facilitate retail payment transactions for the public. The implementation of BI-FAST by banks to their customers will be carried out in stages in accordance with the bank's plan in preparing payment channels for their respective customers.

BI Governor Perry Warjiyo said that BI-FAST is an important milestone in reforming the digitalization of the national payment system as part of the joint implementation of BSPI 2025. QRIS, SNAP, and reform of payment system regulations. This is a national initiative to create a more efficient retail SP infrastructure to meet people's needs in fast, easy, cheap, secure and reliable economic and financial transactions.

"I hope that the launch of BI-FAST will accelerate the digitization of the national financial economy, integrate the payment system industry ecosystem in a commensurate manner." end-to-end from digital banking, fintech, e-commerce, and consumers, encourage financial economic inclusion, and encourage national economic recovery," said Perry at the launch of BI FAST, Tuesday (21/12).

In the early stages in December 2021, BI-FAST implementation will focus on individual credit transfer services with 21 participants batch 1 that has been go live. For other prospective participants who have not entered as participants batch 1, Bank Indonesia remains open for the next batch of participants to become BI-FAST participants. Furthermore, the service will be gradually expanded to include services bulk credit, direct debit, and request for payment.

Customers can transact using BI-FAST in various payment instruments, such as debit or credit notes, electronic money, and card-based payment instruments. Then you can use the channel from Plate, mobile banking, internet banking, ATM or EDC, and agents.

"Furthermore, we will continue to encourage other prospective participants to join in the next stages. In the 4th week of January there will be a relaunch, with the hope that by 2022 all industries can take advantage of BI-FAST for the benefit of the people."

BI-FAST technology and membership

For the record, this new system will complement the existing retail payment service, namely the Bank Indonesia National Clearing System (SKNBI). However, the BI-FAST service is claimed to be superior in terms of time efficiency to lower tariffs.

BI stipulates the tariff that must be paid by participants, in this case banks, to BI as the operator, amounting to Rp19 per transaction. Meanwhile, the rate charged by banks to customers is a maximum of IDR 2.500 per transaction. This fee is cheaper than the SKNBI tariff of Rp. 2.900. The central bank also sets the maximum nominal limit for BI-FAST transactions in stages, starting from IDR 250 million at the initial stage.

BI claims the speed of payment settlement only takes 25 seconds, operates 24 hours and a full week. This speed is not only at the customer level, but also at the banking settlement itself. “If now some transfers online in the customer indeed real-time, but at the bank it's H+1," said Filianingsih Hendra, Assistant Governor to the Head of the BI Payment System Policy Department, quoting from Dataword.

Another advantage of BI-FAST is that it has features proxy addresses, which allows transfers not only to be made with an account number but also proxy addresses registered, in the form of a cellphone number or email address.

In the implementation of BI-FAST, the central bank issues policy as stated in PADG No. 23/25/PADG/2021 as a guide for prospective participants and BI-FAST participants. BI-FAST participants are banks or non-bank institutions (LSB) and other parties, as long as they meet the predetermined criteria.

It is stated that banks that can become direct participants must have a minimum core capital of IDR 6 trillion and a minimum paid-up capital of IDR 100 billion for non-bank institutions. In other words, banks whose core capital is still below this figure can only become indirect participants by cooperating with direct participants for the settlement of payment transactions.

From the customer side, the BI-FAST transfer fee that applies to indirect participants will be more expensive than direct participants because there are additional fees charged.

Flip's Response

The presence of BI-FAST can be said to be a threat to startups such as Flip and Oy! which provides free interbank transfer fees. To DailySocial.id, Co-founder and CEO of Flip Rafi Putra Arriyan said that his party always welcomes the policies made by Bank Indonesia because they are in line with Flip's vision in presenting fair financial technology solutions for all people in Indonesia.

"To support this initiative, we are committed to continuing our efforts and innovation by utilizing technology to provide the best quality, both for practicality, convenience, and speed in transactions for customers throughout Indonesia."

Flip products are actually not only interbank transfers without fees, there are also remittances, purchases of digital products, e-wallet top up, and transfer management solutions for B2B. Although the product Flip head-to-head directly with BI-FAST, Flip actually charges a fee of IDR 2.500 per transaction if the user sends funds more than the maximum limit of IDR 5 million in a day. This fee is exactly the same as that charged by BI-FAST.

Recently, the company has provided 24-hour operational hours to provide users with more flexible access to transfer funds at a number of banks, for now. Previously, Flip limited its operating hours from 7am to 8pm.