The APBS was conceptualized by NPCI
in the mid 2011, with Reserve Bank of India, according permission to launch it
in October 2011.
Bank of India was the first bank to go live on APBS, followed by ICICI Bank and
Union Bank of India.
The testing field was the state of
Jharkhand.
APBS was built around the Aadhaar
Numbers being issued by UIDAI. The Aadhaar number is the common link
between the Government Departments and the beneficiary.
The core idea of APBS is to ensure that the
Aadhaar number holder receives his/her funds from the Government in the
respective bank account. The Aadhaar number holder need not inform all the
government departments in case of the change of his bank account number.
The mapping between the bank account number
and the Aadhaar number would be via the ‘Mapper Module’, built in APBS.
In the long run, this approach would result
in a) minimal transaction cost b) reduced TAT c) minimal customer complaints d)
minimal recon issues.
The present process flow is as follows: -
01)
The
government departments submit the transaction files to NPCI via their Sponsor
Bank between 10.30am to 12.30pm.
02)Around 2.00pm, NPCI switches the
transactions to the recipient banks, to the banks as mapped on the Aadhaar
Mapper which is a part of APBS.
03)By 3.00pm the beneficiary banks would have
passed on the credits to the respective beneficiary account holders.
04)By 5.00pm, the beneficiary banks intimate
NPCI the status of the individual transactions i.e successful or rejected.
05)By 7.00pm, NPCI updates the statuses to the
Sponsor Banks.
All
the above happens on the same day. Initially there is only one payment cycle.
Yes, the APBS can handle multiple payment cycle, it is up to the sponsor banks
and the government departments to demand more payment cycle, in case of surge
in the volumes.
