High priority vs normal priority payments

A payment can be high priority when the use case requires near-instant confirmation of rejection, for example when paying in-store, or normal priority, for example when using Nexus for P2P or bill payments.

Whether a payment is high priority or not is flagged using the pacs.008 Instruction Priority element(/Document/FIToFICstmrCdtTrf/CdtTrfTxInf/PmtTpInf/InstrPrty/).

In general the Source PSP should set the Instruction Priority, based on what it knows about the type of payment that is being initiated. For example, payments to a retail business, or initiated by scanning a QR code, are more likely to be time sensitive. If the Sender is asked to select the priority, they should be informed of the implications of their choice.

High priority payments

High priority payments must only be accepted by the Destination IPS if the Destination IPS has made the final clearing and settlement of the transaction subject to a pacs.002 confirmation message from Nexus.

• The Source PSP should set the pacs.008 Instruction Priority to HIGH

• Within the timeout SLA of the Destination IPS, the Destination PSP must process the payment and return a pacs.002 with one of the following status codes:

  • ACWP – accepted without posting

  • RJCT – rejected

  • BLCK - funds blocked and will not be returned (due to suspicious or illicit activity)

• The Destination IPS must send the pacs.002 to Nexus within the timeout SLA. Nexus will confirm receipt with a confirmation pacs.002 back to the Destination IPS. This allows the Destination IPS to finalize clearing and confirm to the Destination SAP and Destination PSP.

• In the scenario the Destination IPS does not receive a pacs.002 from the Destination PSP before the timeout SLA, the Destination IPS must cancel the payment and send a negative pacs.002 Nexus, rejecting the transaction.

• The pacs.002 will be forwarded to the Source IPS by Nexus to finalize the clearing in the Source country.

• In the scenario Nexus does not receive a pacs.002 from the Destination IPS before the timeout SLA, Nexus will cancel the transaction, send a camt.056 cancellation to the Destination IPS, and a negative pacs.002 to the Source IPS, rejecting the transaction.

Normal priority payments

• The Source PSP should set the pacs.008 Instruction Priority to NORM (pacs.008 element /Document/FIToFICstmrCdtTrf/CdtTrfTxInf/PmtTpInf/InstrPrty/ ) when the payment is not urgent.

• Within the technical timeout SLA of the Destination IPS, the Destination PSP must process the payment and send back a pacs.002 with one of the following status codes:

  • ACCC – accepted and credited to recipient

  • ACWP – accepted without posting

  • PDNG – pending

  • RJCT – rejected

  • BLCK – funds blocked and will not be returned (due to suspicious or illicit activity)

• The Destination IPS must send the pacs.002 to Nexus within the timeout SLA. Nexus will confirm receipt with a confirmation pacs.002 back to the Destination IPS.

• When the Destination IPSO or the Destination PSP cannot process the Nexus payment instantly (either accept or reject), they should respond with a pacs.002 with status PNDG. In this case, Nexus will keep the transaction pending and await the final response from the Destination IPSO.

• A pacs.002 with a final status (ACCC, ACWP, RJCT or BLCK) will flow from the Destination PSP to Destination IPS, to Nexus, to the Source IPS and finally to the Source PSP.

• In the scenario Nexus does not receive a pacs.002 from the Destination IPS before the timeout SLA, Nexus will invoke its exception process, see Investigations.