Link Credit Union’s Current Account operates using the SEPA payment system and is not a member of SWIFT. Please refer to details of these payments services below.
If a member wants to receive a payment into their current account from outside of the EEA, that payment would have to be facilitated using a financial services company such as Currency Fair to direct that payment directly to their account at the Credit Union. The member would book a rate and the financial services company would send the payment in EURO to a correspondent bank and then give instructions for the payment to be routed onward to the Credit Union member account via SEPA only, or the remitting bank may route the payment themselves through a correspondent bank they use for EURO flows with clear instructions to send the payment via SEPA when received by the Correspondent bank in the Eurozone.
You may have seen the terms SWIFT or SEPA pop up quite a lot when banking, but you may not know exactly what these terms represent and how they work. Understanding SWIFT and SEPA is useful because you’re likely to use at least one of them at some point if you ever need to make an international wire transfer.
Both are ways to make international payments, with SEPA serving the Eurozone and SWIFT operating worldwide. When you transfer money to an overseas account, banks need a secure way to communicate financial information to each other, and both SEPA and SWIFT facilitate this process.
What is SEPA?
SEPA, short for Single Europe Payments Area, is similar to SWIFT, however it exists specifically for banking and transfers within Europe. It is much newer than SWIFT, having only been established in the late-2000s.
SEPA payments can only be in euro, unlike SWIFT which operates in many currencies. 28 EU countries in the Eurozone are part of the SEPA zone, along with Monaco, San Marino, four members of the European Free Trade Association – Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway, and Switzerland, and other non-Eurozone countries including the UK.
To make a payment via SEPA, you simply need a euro account and the IBAN of the recipient – you don’t need a BIC. In terms of the transfer process itself, SEPA payments happen much quicker than SWIFT transfers. A regular SEPA payment may take up to two days to arrive, however a new scheme known as SEPA Instant Payment or SCT Inst is able to process transfers within 10 seconds.
What is SWIFT?
SWIFT stands for Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications, and has been the leader in facilitating inter-currency wire transfers since it was introduced in the early 1970s. Just about every country in the world is connected to the SWIFT network, allowing local banks and institutions to process SWIFT transfers. Link Credit Union, is not a member of SWIFT and cannot participate directly in these transactions.
Not only does SWIFT provide a secure means of sending money abroad, it also makes it very straightforward. Paying somebody overseas via SWIFT is not too dissimilar from a domestic payment. An IBAN is an International Bank Account Number, which is provided with your bank account and tied to the SWIFT network. A BIC is a Bank Identifier Code, which SWIFT assigns to each bank; it is also sometimes referred to as a SWIFT code. To make a SWIFT payment, you’ll need to know the recipient’s IBAN – which they can find in their bank account, and BIC – which can be found online.
SWIFT payments can be made in any currency and converted to any currency. You might choose for the payment to be converted upon arrival, or you may choose to convert the currency before it’s sent. A SWIFT payment can take up to four working days, and SWIFT transfer fees differ depending on the bank. Both the sender and recipient may be charged fees for a SWIFT transfer.
For any further information please email info@linkcu.ie or phone 042 967 5000