Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das on Friday (October 9,2020) said that online transfer of funds via Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) will be available round-the-clock from December 2020.

The step is being taken to "facilitate innovations in the large value payments ecosystem and promote ease of doing business".

“In order to facilitate swift and seamless payments in real time for domestic businesses and institutions, it has been decided to make available the RTGS system round the clock, on all days from December 2020. India will be among very few countries globally with a 24x7x365 large value real time payment system," Das said in a virtual briefing.

RTGS enables real time transfer of funds to the beneficiary account. According to the central bank, "real time" means the processing of instructions at the time they are received and "gross settlement" implies that settlement of funds transfer instructions occurs individually.

Currently, RTGS is available on all days when most bank branches are functioning, including Saturdays. It is primarily meant for large value transactions. Minimum amount to be remitted through RTGS is Rs200,000, with no upper or maximum ceiling.

Last year, the central bank had allowed transfer of funds via National Electronic Funds Transfer (NEFT) system on a 24x7x365 basis from December. 2019. “The system has been operating smoothly since then," Das said.