Cayman Banks and Prism sign agreement to implement local Clearing House services

13 July, 2018

ACH (Cayman) Limited,  a company formed through a partnership of six retail banks, is pleased to announce effective September 15th 2017, the signing of a contract with Prism Services (Cayman) Limited for the provision of local Automated Clearing House (ACH) services.

The partner banks are Fidelity Bank, Cayman National Bank Ltd., CIBC FirstCaribbean International Bank (Cayman) Ltd, RBC Royal Bank Cayman Limited, Butterfield Bank and Scotiabank & Trust (Cayman) Ltd.

Prism Services (Cayman) Ltd is a part of Prism Services Holdings Ltd, a company with twenty- four years of consulting and processing experience in payments. Prism has clients in over twenty-two countries regionally and a group of skilled and certified local and regional employees who enable the consistent delivery of superior financial transaction processing, project management, document management, mail fulfilment and Tier 2 data center services. More specifically, Prism’s companies have been providing ACH management services to the Caribbean for fifteen years.

ACH, or  Automated Clearing House, is a nationwide electronic payment network that allows the exchange and settlement of cheques, electronic payments and payment-related information between financial institutions. This transmission of payment-related information is completed through a process known as electronic data interchange. This is governed by strict rules and agreements between financial institutions and the ACH central operator that ensures a safe and secure exchange of information. 

The benefits of an ACH system are far reaching and include efficiency gains, convenience and shortened settlement. Globally, employees have grown accustomed to the convenience of receiving their salaries electronically via direct deposit and reducing the need for wait times to access funds from paper cheques.

Employers also save on operational costs as payroll direct deposit is less expensive than issuing paper cheques. Companies enjoy improvement in cash-flows, as they are assured automated payments on agreed dates, versus relying on more traditional means of account receivable collection. Using the ACH is also a green alternative at it reduces the resources used in the creation and transportation of paper cheques. The project to establish the ACH system and interconnectivity within the retail banks to enable the delivery of ACH services in Cayman, commenced in April 2016 and is well progressed in a phased approach. We see both this partnership and project as positive for the Cayman market, which will introduce innovative services to allow for the timely movement of funds between companies and individuals within the local market. As the project progresses, please look out for more communications across various media that will be geared towards helping the consumer to understand and access these new services.