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The resistance against instant payments mostly has to do with technicalities around bank balance sheets and inter-bank settlement systems. It's a bit complex f

The resistance against instant payments mostly has to do with technicalities around bank balance sheets and inter-bank settlement systems. It's a bit complex for a comment, but the TLDR is: * funds in transit (called "positive float") are held in the banks account, and can be used by the bank to earn interest * liquidity management - there are a bunch of considerations here, but the longer settlement periods enable banks to do "deferred net settlements" (just paying each other the difference between all transactions in a batched way) and also helps balance sheets in other ways, making it easier to meet reserve requirements, smoothing out intra-day liquidity, etc The delay also means systems have more time to catch fraudulent transactions, and to block them before they happen.

tchalla 1y ago
This comment is not towards you but there's always an excuse with the big German banks. For example, during Covid when interest rates where negative - some major German banks like Commerzbank charged interest from customers when their balance exceeded an amount like 50000€. Now that the interest rates have gone up - they are not even close to passing on those high interest rates. The same Commerzbank now asks for 50000€ in assets otherwise they charge a 4.90€ subscription charge from their customers. So yeah there might be technicalities but nothing stops those technicalities being addressed until the law does.
- the_duke 1y ago
  To be clear: I didn't mean they have to drag their feet. They just do it because they will lose some income.
- kuschku 1y ago
  As a reluctant Commerzbank customer, there's some inaccuracies. The amount was 100k€ re: negative interest, and the subscription charge only applies if you're not moving a certain amount of money each month (which is very low, even unemployment payments would be enough to clear that hurdle). So you're only paying for your second or third account.
  - tchalla 1y ago
    > the subscription charge only applies if you're not moving a certain amount of money This has changed since May 2025. Talk about inaccuracies ;) Btw, as much as I appreciate the “correction” it doesn’t change overall direction of the comment.
    - kuschku 1y ago
      > This has changed since May 2025. Talk about inaccuracies ;) It has? I've never paid a subscription charge, and I've never been above that amount.
fransje26 1y ago
> The delay also means systems have more time to catch fraudulent transactions, and to block them before they happen. Which is complete nonsense as the transaction is actually forward-payed, and guaranteed by the central European bank, exactly for that reason. So, in fact, the only reason why certain banks delay payments is so that they can keep the funds "in transit" to earn interests. Plenty of banks don't play that game, so if your bank does, they are taking the piss and it's time to change.

tchalla 1y ago

This comment is not towards you but there's always an excuse with the big German banks. For example, during Covid when interest rates where negative - some major German banks like Commerzbank charged interest from customers when their balance exceeded an amount like 50000€. Now that the interest rates have gone up - they are not even close to passing on those high interest rates. The same Commerzbank now asks for 50000€ in assets otherwise they charge a 4.90€ subscription charge from their customers. So yeah there might be technicalities but nothing stops those technicalities being addressed until the law does.

the_duke 1y ago
To be clear: I didn't mean they have to drag their feet. They just do it because they will lose some income.
kuschku 1y ago
As a reluctant Commerzbank customer, there's some inaccuracies. The amount was 100k€ re: negative interest, and the subscription charge only applies if you're not moving a certain amount of money each month (which is very low, even unemployment payments would be enough to clear that hurdle). So you're only paying for your second or third account.
- tchalla 1y ago
  > the subscription charge only applies if you're not moving a certain amount of money This has changed since May 2025. Talk about inaccuracies ;) Btw, as much as I appreciate the “correction” it doesn’t change overall direction of the comment.
  - kuschku 1y ago
    > This has changed since May 2025. Talk about inaccuracies ;) It has? I've never paid a subscription charge, and I've never been above that amount.

fransje26 1y ago

> The delay also means systems have more time to catch fraudulent transactions, and to block them before they happen. Which is complete nonsense as the transaction is actually forward-payed, and guaranteed by the central European bank, exactly for that reason. So, in fact, the only reason why certain banks delay payments is so that they can keep the funds "in transit" to earn interests. Plenty of banks don't play that game, so if your bank does, they are taking the piss and it's time to change.