The Federal Reserve Board and The Clearing House Payments Co. LLC have completed and distributed technical specifications for banks to use when transmitting cover payments over the SwiftNet system.
The Fed and The Clearing House, which operate the nation's domestic wire transfer systems, said Monday that they expect banks to start testing the new format in May or June, and that it should officially take effect in November of next year.
Last year The Clearing House and Wolfsberg Group, an organization of 12 large international banking companies, made an unusual public appeal asking the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication to amend its cover payment formats to include more detailed information about senders and receivers, so banks could perform proper anti-laundering assessments on wire payments moving across SwiftNet.
