There is a clear trend towards Real-time Retail Payment Systems on a global basis. Retail payment systems were left behind the surge of technological innovation and remained inbackward systems. To get out of this situation, several countries try to build new retail payment systems, i. e. Real-time Retail Payment Systems (RT-RPS). Most of these RT-RPSs have common characteristics: near-real-time payment, 24/7/365 operation and mobile payment function.
These reforms have its roots in U.K. which introduced“Faster Payments”as RT-RPS and “Paym”as mobile payment service. This trend has spread to Singapore and Australia. Then at last, U.S. and euro area has started the similar project for sophisticated retail payment system, which means that making RT-PRS is becoming a global trend. Japanese banking society should take appropriate action to keep up with this global trend.