Frequently Asked Questions

A1. The Faster Payment System (FPS) is a financial infrastructure which connects banks and stored-value facilities (SVFs), enabling their customers to transfer Hong Kong dollar or Renminbi funds to different banks/SVFs in Hong Kong almost instantly on a round-the-clock basis.

In addition, all FPS participants (including banks and SVFs) can process the customers' funds transfer instructions through the FPS by batch.  Transaction time is subject to the services provided by individual participants.

A2. Banks and SVFs develop their own payment products and services riding on the FPS platform.  Customers may make use of the payment services and products offered by their banks and SVFs to pay via FPS.  For example, log on the mobile/internet banking or SVF payment app, and look for fund transfer function in the menu that displays the name or logo of FPS.

A3. If a payer and a payee have accounts with any banks or SVFs that support FPS real-time payments, the fund transfer can be processed instantly via FPS.

A4. Almost all retail banks and SVFs with e-wallets (see list) provide instant payment service via the FPS. 

A5. Banks and SVFs (participants) providing FPS-related services in general would support instant credit transfer payment, direct debit payment, addressing service and electronic direct debit authorisation. The specific scope, channel and interface in providing the services may vary among the FPS participants. Participants may also develop different FPS-related products and services subject to their business needs and operations. Please refer to your banks or SVFs for more details.

A6. FPS operates 24/7 throughout the year, including weekends and holidays. Please check with your bank or SVF about their service availability on weekends or holidays.

A7. Please contact your banks or SVFs for details on service charges.

A8. Yes.  The FPS operators, banks and SVF licensees are all under the HKMA’s oversight.  They are required to implement appropriate and adequate security measures for technology risk management and online payment services (e.g. introducing two-factor authentication and default transaction limit for funds transfer over a certain threshold) to ensure that the clearing and settlement system and various online payment services can operate safely and efficiently, so as to provide customers with appropriate protection.

A9. You may register your mobile number or email address with a bank or SVF e-wallet, or request a bank or SVF e-wallet to generate an FPS ID for you, so that a payer may enter your mobile number, email address or FPS ID to send funds to you.

If you have not registered your mobile number, email address or FPS ID for using FPS, a payer has to enter your name, the name of your bank/SVF and the account number so as to send funds to you.

FPS does not require senders to register with the FPS.  Nonetheless, participating banks or SVFs may ask their customers to register before they can use FPS to send payments.  Please contact your bank or SVF for more details

A10. FPS ID is a string of numbers generated by the FPS system to link up with a bank or SVF account. Please note that each FPS ID is unique and can only be linked with one bank or SVF account. Individuals, merchants and corporates may request an FPS ID from their banks or SVFs depending on their FPS service scopes. Please refer to your banks or SVFs for more details.

Currently the FPS ID is a 7-digit number and the system has been designed to prepare for the issuance and the use of 9-digit FPS ID to meet the growing needs in future. In view of the increasing demand for FPS ID, the system has started generating 9-digit number FPS ID recently to cater for the needs. However, some banks and SVFs need to upgrade their systems to handle the 9-digit FPS ID. As such, the FPS operator has followed up with banks and SVFs immediately and coordinated their system upgrade.

Banks and SVFs will provide assistance to the affected customers, for instance, by providing a new 7-digit FPS ID to replace the 9-digit FPS ID. Customers may also use mobile number or email address as account proxy to receive payments. If customers have any problems in using the FPS ID to pay or receive payments, please contact your banks or SVFs for assistance.

A11: You may register your mobile number through your mobile/internet banking or SVF payment app.  Select an account to link up with the mobile number, and then the bank or the SVF would verify if you are holding the mobile number before processing your registration request.  If you have any questions, please approach your bank or SVF for assistance.

You may also link up more than one bank or SVF with your mobile number.  In that case, specify one of the banks/SVFs as the default account to receive funds.  This means that the funds will be sent to your default receiving bank/SVF if the sender does not specify a particular bank/SVF.

There is no need to link up the mobile number or email address with all your bank or SVF accounts.  Just register the one(s) based on your needs.

A12: If you make a payment to a recipient using his/her mobile number or email address which has not been registered, the payment will be rejected.

A13: You may make amendments through the mobile/internet banking or SVF payment app of any banks/SVFs that you have linked up the mobile number, email address or FPS ID with.  Notification will be sent to you after any changes have been made in the registration.

A19: A user when registering the mobile number through a bank or SVF with the FPS should agree to provide information on his/her name, mobile number and name of bank or SVF to the FPS.  The bank or SVF should have the identity of the user and the mobile number verified before registering the mobile number for their customers with the FPS.  In making a payment, a sender may see the masked name and the bank or SVF (in case it is not a default bank or SVF) so as to check the payment information before confirming the payment.

No information on bank or SVF account numbers or any other personal information will be registered with the FPS.  Such information will be maintained by corresponding banks and SVFs only.

A20. In case your bank does not support instant payment, you may still send or receive funds through your bank though it would take a longer time (a few hours or until the next business day) for the transfer to be completed.

A21. Yes if both the payer and payee institutions support FPS payments. You may transfer money from a bank account to an SVF or from an SVF to a bank account.  You may also transfer funds between SVFs.

A22. All banks in Hong Kong can receive funds transferred via the FPS, but not all of them would be able to receive funds for their customers instantly.  See the list of retail banks and SVFs with e-wallets which can process instant payment via the FPS.

A23. Banks and SVFs have defined different thresholds for various types of payment or transfers based on their business models and risk control management.  Please contact your banks or SVFs for more details.

A24: Your bank/SVF will inform you if the payment goes through successfully. Please approach your banks/SVFs for more information, including the record of payment.

A25. No, currently, the FPS only supports HKD or RMB transfers from/to an account in Hong Kong.

A26. Users should verify the payment details, including the payee’s name and the amount, before sending a payment – both when the details are given to you and when you use the details to make the payment.

A27. Inform your bank/SVF as soon as possible if you are not able to contact the recipient directly to request return of the money.  Your bank/SVF will provide assistance as appropriate.

Q28. Please check if the details of your payment instructions are correct, and if so, a payer may contact his/her bank/SVF to enquire about the transaction status and obtain the FPS reference number so as to provide it to the payee bank/SVF to follow up. However, if unfortunately, the transfer was made to a wrong mobile number or email address, please contact your bank/SVF for assistance on arranging refund.

Furthermore, if the transfer was not made to a specific bank/SVF, you can suggest the payee to double check which bank/SVF is the default receiving entity and then check whether the funds was transferred to the account of that bank/SVF. The payee can login to his/her mobile/internet banking or e-wallet to check the FPS registration settings on the accounts registered and locate the record with 'default' specified. This is against the background that a mobile number may be linked to more than one bank/e-wallet for receiving funds, and thus the customer would have to specify one of the banks/e-wallets as the default account for receiving funds from a payer who does not specify a particular payee bank/e-wallet.

A29. Please follow the instructions as set out in individual SVF payment apps.  You may be required to provide information on your identity and bank account to be debited for top-up purpose.

A30. Banks and SVFs would ensure that they protect the privacy of your personal data by complying with the relevant laws, rules and operating procedures.

A31. Inform your bank as soon as possible if you are not able to contact the recipient directly to request return of the money.

A32. Please contact your bank to cancel a direct debit authorization.

A33. No, only you or a person authorized by you can set up a direct debit to debit your account.  You may submit your authorisation to your bank directly or through the beneficiary facing FPS Participant.

A34. Customers may set limits in their direct debit authorizations to different parties.  Please contact your banks or SVFs for more details.

A35. You may use the scanner function provided in your mobile banking or SVF payment app to scan the QR code of the payee to make payments.  You can make payment via FPS using QR code to users of FPS participating institutions supporting QR code payments.

A36. You can use your mobile banking or SVF payment app to generate the QR code if your bank/SVF supports QR code payments through the FPS.

A37. Customers should verify the payment details, including the payee’s name and the amount, displayed on the mobile app or payment app before confirming a payment.

A38. A payee-presented QR code embeds information of the payee’s registered FPS proxy ID (i.e. mobile number, email address or FPS ID) and the name of the receiving bank/SVF. Some QR codes also contain information of the payment amount. The payer only needs to scan the QR code provided by the payee with his/her mobile banking or e-wallet app to transfer funds or settle a payment in a simple, quick and accurate manner. Nonetheless, a third party may scan the QR code to obtain the embedded information. Payees should show the QR code to others only when necessary.

A39. No registration is needed.  You only need to enable the QR code scanner of your mobile banking app or e-wallet, which supports Government bill payments through FPS QR code, and then use it to scan the FPS QR code printed on the Government bills to make payment.

A40. Please visit fps.hkicl.com.hk/govtpayments for the list of banks and e-wallets supporting the Government QR code bill payments.

A41. No, it is free of charge.

A42. You may check the transaction history of your bank or e-wallet. Where needed, you may contact the relevant Government departments for assistance.