Customers with accounts in France and Ireland: regulatory demise of SEPA Credit Transfer processing of instructions in CFONB and Irish Standard 18 file formats

From 20 March 2016, the file format conversion services for SEPA Credit Transfer (SCT) instructions using local file formats - Irish Standard 18 (in Ireland) and CFONB (in France) will be demised* and these two file formats will no longer be allowed for SCT instructions.

If you are using either of the above mentioned file formats for initiating SCT instructions and have not yet done so, please review and amend the file formats you use for SCT payments. We strongly encourage you to proactively contact your internal teams to ensure that the appropriate file format is used for sending SCT payments instructions.

After 20 March, all SCT payments instructions made using Irish Standard 18 or CFONB file formats will be rejected and will need to be re-sent using the appropriate file format.

In the meantime, if you have questions concerning your current formats or need guidance to plan your XML readiness and other alternatives, please discuss with your HSBC Representative.

* Pursuant to Regulation (EU) No 260/2012 (The SEPA End Date Regulation) and Clause 11.2 of HSBC’s termination of the Payment Message Format Conversion Service Agreement).