Faster Payments beats £1bn in one day

The Faster Payments Service (FPS) has seen £1bn of transactions processed in one day for the first time.

On 2 March, the service processed five million interbank payments to set the new daily record, according to payments association Apacs.

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A spokeswoman for Apacs said by far the most common type of payment to go through the service was standing orders, accounting for four million of the transactions processed that day. Other payments processed by the service include online and phone payments.

Apacs said the spike in transactions is likely to be the result of the day being at the start of the month, a time when the majority of standing orders are pushed through.

The FPS was launched in May 2008 to speed up payments between participating banks so they can be cleared on the same day.

The FPS' previous daily record was set in December 2008 when four million payments to the value of £730m were processed.

Since the service began, it has processed more than 125 million payments with a value of £46bn.

Apacs forecasts the number of interbank online, phone and standing order payments made through the FPS will grow from 472 million in 2007 to 622 million in 2017.

The volume of payments going through the service has consistently grown month on month, with the only dip coming in December 2008 to January this year. According to Apacs figures, month on month volumes have nearly trebled since last July, to more than 18 million payments last month.