SVPCO, the paper and electronic check exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., reports that the SVPCO Image Payments Network set records for both monthly items and dollar value in June 2008.   » Continue Reading

The CheckImage Collaborative has announced the creation of a Universal Companion Document (UCD) which establishes a uniform industry approach for populating and validating check image files. Since the implementation of the Check Clearing Act for the 21st Century (Check 21) in October 2004, the banking industry has been rapidly transforming from a paper-based check clearing structure to an image-based system with nearly half of all checks paid cleared as images today. Ongoing interoperability issues have impacted the industry's ability to realize the full value of check image clearing. One of the biggest obstacles to true interoperability has been the use of the check image file format standard. The creation of the UCD establishes a consistent approach for all industry participants to use when processing check image files.   » Continue Reading

Viewpointe has announced that Fifth Third Bank will begin using Viewpointe's Pointe2Pointe solution for check image exchange.   » Continue Reading

Mitek Systems has announced ImageNet Mobile Deposit, calling it "the first mobile banking software that allow banks to accept paper check deposits and bill payments via camera-equipped mobile phones." Mitek will demonstrate ImageNet Mobile Deposit in booth #225 at the BAI-TransPay show beginning February 5, 2008 in Dallas at the Gaylord Grapevine Resort.   » Continue Reading

Fiserv and Viewpointe have announced that Fiserv will use the Viewpointe archive to expand its current image storage offerings to its 1,600 check processing clients. According to Viewpointe, "as an archive user, Fiserv joins several of the nation's largest financial institutions in having access to the most robust common archive in the industry. Fiserv will continue to use its current image archive for delivery of products such as image statements, CD/ROMs and DVDs."   » Continue Reading

SVPCO has announced that its monthly image items and dollar volume grew strongly in September compared to a year ago - processing 255.3 million in total monthly items, a 218.3% increase compared to a year ago representing $427.8 billion in total monthly dollar value, a 119.9% increase compared to a year ago.   » Continue Reading

In an article titled 'Fewer Folks Getting Out Checkbooks', Michael Coit writes about the move away from the use of checks. "At Bank of the West, the fifth largest bank in California, check volumes have been cut in half since 1990 to 45 percent of all non-cash transactions today."

NetDeposit has announced "it has been awarded two new patents, Nos. 7,181,430 and 7,216,106, from the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) for the processes and technologies involved in remote electronic presentment of all types of checks. The patents cover NetDeposit's array of software products and services, which enable electronic check presentment and payment."   » Continue Reading

Unisys has announced it will design and help implement a new electronic check and image processing system in a consulting, software and hardware agreement with the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland, acting on behalf of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks.   » Continue Reading

Wells Fargo has announced the launch of Returned Item & Deposit Details, an enhancement to its Wells Fargo Business Online Banking service. According to the bank, "with this rollout, Wells Fargo is one of the first major U.S. financial institutions to offer small- to mid-sized business customers access to electronic images of returned items, as well as an array of other electronic images, including cleared checks and deposited checks - as part of its online banking service."   » Continue Reading

Brink’s U.S. and Metavante have announced the launch of Metavante’s Sendpoint distributed image capture service to Brinks’ cash vaults across the country. Metavante’s Sendpoint service provides for the remote image capture and image exchange of deposits and payments received from Brink's Vaults, accelerating deposit capture from receipt through posting and presentment.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO, the check image and paper check business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., has announced that its average daily check image items and dollar value exceeded its paper check items and dollar value for the first time in its history during April.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO - Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company, has announced that The Bank of New York is now participating in the SVPCO Image Payments Network.   » Continue Reading

In a report titled "Report to the Congress on the Check Clearing for the 21st Century Act of 2003" (PDF), the Federal Reserve reports "on the effect of the Check Clearing for the 21st Century Act on the nation's check-collection system. Assesses the need for modifications to the funds-availability requirements established in and pursuant to the Expedited Funds Availability Act (EFAA). Based on the Board's extensive survey of the banking industry and supplemented with other information from official and industry sources."

Endpoint Exchange LLC, a Metavante company, and SVPCO – Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company LLC, have announced that member financial institutions of both systems can now exchange check data and images.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO has announced that the total number of check images and the dollar value hit an all-time high in March reaching a total of 177.4 million in total monthly items, a 507% increase compared to a year ago. March's volumes totaled $333.8 billion in total monthly dollar value from an average of 8 million daily items.   » Continue Reading

Fiserv has announced it is now exchanging checks with Bank of America through Viewpointe, a provider of check image exchange and archive services in the United States. The agreement enables Bank of America to connect to thousands of endpoints on the Fiserv Clearing Network, while allowing other Fiserv customers to exchange images directly with Bank of America.   » Continue Reading

DataTreasury Corporation has announced a worldwide licensing agreement with Diebold for the use of four of the company's financial transaction patents relating to "technologies involved in the electronic processing of checks and other financial instruments and include claims related to the capture, transmission, encryption, storing and retrieval of electronic images generated from these types of documents."   » Continue Reading

Mercator Advisory Group has published a new report titled "Commercial Capture Solutions" that examines the rapid growth in check image deposits last year and the increasing use of check images for inter-bank transfers.   » Continue Reading

TowerGroup has published a new report titled "Check 21 in 2007: The Year of Image Exchange" on bank adoption of Check 21 - predicting that 2007 will be the first year in which monthly check image exchange volumes surpass paper check presentment volumes.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO-Electronic Clearing Services has reported that the number of check images exchanged in 2006 soared 15-fold compared to 2005, while the dollar value jumped 5-fold year-over-year.   » Continue Reading

Eastman Kodak has announced a new check processing solution and strategic relationship with CFC Technology Corporation that is "designed to help organizations of all sizes take advantage of Check 21 benefits, allowing for businesses to remotely scan their incoming checks, which is a far more cost effective way to handle business deposits."   » Continue Reading

Endpoint Exchange has announced that 12 of the country’s top 25 banks (by asset size) joined the company’s national check image exchange network in 2006.   » Continue Reading

The Canadian Payments Association has posted a new set of questions and answers about cheque imaging in Canada. Unlike the voluntary exchange of check images enabled by Check 21 in the US, the CPA notes that its imaging initiative is "designed as an industry-wide transition to image-based clearing, with all CPA members participating and exchanging cheque images." Implementation of the new clearing process is targeted to begin in 2008 and to be phased in over approximately a year.

In an article titled 'The U.S. Payments System: Needing Consolidation, or Fine As Is?" by Christopher Westfall, Managing Editor of the KPMG Banking Insider, one senior banker is quoted as saying "right now there are too many ways to pay into too many systems." Westfall's article looks at efforts underway examining potential consolidation of US payments - in particular, convergence of the ACH and check image exchanges.

Glenbrook's Carol Coye Benson spoke yesterday with George F. Thomas, who oversees strategy and product management at The Clearing House in New York. Carol filed this report on her conversation with George.   » Continue Reading

USAA Federal Savings Bank has announced it is now "the largest nationwide bank to offer an easy-to-use, secure new service that enables its customers to deposit checks into their bank accounts using a home scanner and an Internet connection."   » Continue Reading

SVPCO - Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., has announced that U.S. Bank is now exchanging check images via the SVPCO Image Payments Network.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO - Electronic Clearing Services has announced that Sterling National Bank is now participating in the Image Payments Network. Sterling’s first exchange partner is Bank of America.   » Continue Reading

Fiserv has announced that a growing number of U.S. financial institutions have discovered significant increases in one-day funds availability along with lowering labor costs by deploying its Virtual Item Exchange (VIE).   » Continue Reading

Donald L. Kohn, vice chairman of the Federal Reserve Board, is speaking today at the Western Payments Alliance 2006 Payments Symposium being held in Las Vegas, Nevada. A copy of his speech titled "Evolution of Retail Payments and the Role of the Federal Reserve" is available online.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO-Electronic Clearing Services has announced that monthly check image volume in August surpassed $200 billion and 75 million items as compared to $45.3 billion and 5.3 million items in the same month last year.   » Continue Reading

Steve Mott writes for Payments Strategies on the efforts by some in the banking industry to "smash together" check imaging at the point of acceptance with ACH for delivery to the check writer's financial institution. According to Mott, "the stakes are enormous as "checking" goes to the very core of every financial institution's primary customer relationships."

Mike Reagan, Managing Principal of Carreker’s Global Payments Consulting, has published an opinion piece (PDF) about what he calls "All-Consumer Check Conversion (ACC): the automatic conversion of any consumer-written check to ACH at the earliest point possible." Reagan says "The key variable is the willingness of the banking industry to move in a direction that looks at checks not by the way they are processed but by the value they deliver. It is not a question of championing one payments silo over the other, but advancing the electronification agenda in the manner that delivers to customers and derives for banks the best "win-win" value scenario."

Mike Hoeft writes for the Green Bay Press-Gazette about remote check deposit services now being offered by many banks. "Remote deposit gives commercial customers a virtual branch inside their businesses, since checks are electronically sent from desktops instead of requiring trips to a bank to make deposits." ""It's nice because now I don't have to run to the bank anymore," said Bob Eiting, controller at Miron Construction. "I can work until 7 p.m., run the checks through, print out a report and I have credit on my statement the next morning."

IP Commerce and BankServ have announced DepositNow, an online, remote check deposit service designed for small businesses that eliminates trips to the bank by enabling small businesses to deposit checks and manage accounts receivable transactions directly from the convenience of their desktop PC.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO - Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., has announced that The PNC Financial Services Group is now exchanging check images through the SVPCO Image Payments Network.   » Continue Reading

PNC Bank has announced a new online deposit service designed for small businesses that will allow them to initiate the electronic deposit of received checks directly into their bank account with automatically updated accounting records via BankServ's Deposit Now! A/R, a new remote deposit product linked to Intuit’s QuickBooks.   » Continue Reading

NACHA has announced the availability of new education and training materials for businesses and financial institutions to implement NACHA's new rules on identifying business checks that are ineligible for conversion. The new rules, which become effective September 15, 2006, provide methods for corporate Originators to identify business checks that are ineligible to be converted and provide corporate Receivers with methods to opt-out of check conversion.   » Continue Reading

BankServ has announced DepositNow! A/R for QuickBooks - "a new system that lets QuickBooks users deposit checks to their bank accounts electronically from their offices and automatically update their accounting records at the same time. It is the first commercially available remote deposit product that is integrated with Intuit's QuickBooks software, which is currently in use by more than 3 million small businesses in North America."   » Continue Reading

SVPCO - Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., has announced the availability of SVPCO Gateway DTA, a new, low-cost option for gaining access to the SVPCO Image Payments Network.   » Continue Reading

Bank of America announced today that it reached 5 million items exchanged via image in a single day.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO-Electronic Clearing Services has announced that the number of monthly items in May grew 44.4% to an all-time high of 50.8 million.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO-Electronic Clearing Services has announced that the average number of daily items in March grew 24.2% to an all-time high of 1.2 million. For the first quarter of 2006, the total number of daily image items was 62.5 million, compared to 52 million for all of 2005.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO-Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., has reported that daily average check image volume in the Image Payments Network grew 47% in February and surpassed 1 million items a day for the first time.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO - Electronic Clearing Services, the electronic check and check image exchange business of The Clearing House Payments Company L.L.C., has announced that the Federal Reserve is now sending check images to financial institutions via the SVPCO-Image Payments Network.   » Continue Reading

SVPCO has announced that HSBC Bank USA is now exchanging and settling check images through the SVPCO Image Payments Network.   » Continue Reading

The Clearing House Payments Co. has announced that the Federal Reserve is now linked to the SVPCO Image Exchange Network to facilitate the electronic movement of image files.

"The Federal Reserve and SVPCO-Image Exchange Network connection is a major milestone for the nation's payments system, and it will help usher in a new era of clearing checks in an all-electronic environment that will benefit institutions nationwide," said George Thomas, Executive Vice President of The Clearing House. "The early volumes being sent through the Image Exchange Network are significant, and we expect that to increase substantially in 2005."

SVPCO Check Services has announced the launch of SVPCO National Check Exchange, a new national check clearing service that "provides participating institutions with the ability to exchange checks across regions more efficiently, following a universal set of rules."   » Continue Reading

SVPCO has announced the official production launch of its Image Exchange Network following a two month trial period with KeyBank and JPMorgan Chase.   » Continue Reading