CYBG : completes transfer to Image Clearing System

CYBG has announced its Clydesdale Bank and Yorkshire Bank branches are now completely image cheque enabled, well ahead of the industry deadline.

Following the completion of the mobile app feature in early 2018, the Bank has undertaken an extensive programme of work to migrate its Customer Banking Centres to the Image Clearing System (ICS). This now means that all customers can benefit from next day clearing, no longer having to wait the historic six working days for funds to be deposited into their account.

CYBG's dual customer offer of using the ICS via its mobile banking apps or in branch has allowed it to be at the forefront of this industry transformation. It is the only bank to currently offer both to customers, offering a choice of how they want to deposit their cheques. The introduction of ICS is providing banks and building societies with the option of providing customers with a more convenient way to deposit cheques without needing to visit a branch and speeding up the time it takes for cheques to clear.

Mark Curran, Director of Payments and Open Banking at CYBG, said: 'Moving to a complete ICS is an important moment in the Bank's history. Cheques have been around for 350 years and the technology has now caught up with changing consumer behaviour and the demand for more immediate access to funds. We knew this would be an important piece of work to revolutionise the cheque and we have played an instrumental role in working in collaboration with the industry to bring this change to life.

'Implementing the ICS programme has required a huge amount of work, so we are delighted to finish this project well ahead of the industry deadline, as well as being the only Bank to offer more choice to customers in how they can pay cheques into their account.'

Clydesdale and Yorkshire Bank processes around 95,000 cheques every week and the move to the ICS will allow the Bank to stop its clearing runs, reducing its number of miles on UK roads by 263,626 every year, equating to a carbon reduction of 63.29 tonnes.