The International Payments Framework (IPF) was an initiative launched in 2010 to create a global framework for
payment processing
A payment processor is a system that enables financial transactions, commonly employed by a merchant, to handle transactions with customers from various channels such as credit cards and debit cards or bank accounts. They are usually broken do ...
by the ''International Payments Framework Association'', a
trade association headquartered in
Atlanta, in the United States. The IPF standard is currently used by some organisations to process payments between the United States and Europe.
IPF creates rules, processes, and inter-member agreements that allow IPF's members to minimize the cost of cross-border payments. Its members include the
United States Federal Reserve and other central banks, as well as other payments industry entities such as financial institutions and
ACH operators.
IPF is similar to the
Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) in that both initiatives aim to facilitate international payments, base their standards on
ISO 20022, and involve mostly banks as their main participants.
IPF differs from SEPA because IPF is global rather than limited to Europe; IPF is market-based rather than a political initiative; IPF involves more public entities, smaller banks, and clearing houses, rather than larger banks; and IPF superimposes a standard that allows existing national standards to communicate with each other rather than replacing them with a new standard. Unlike SEPA documentation, which is available on the European Payments Council's website, IPF documentation is not available to the public.
See also
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Electronic Banking Internet Communication Standard
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Financial Information eXchange
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FpML
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ISO 20022
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Single Euro Payments Area
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SWIFT
References
{{reflist
Payment systems
Financial routing standards
Financial metadata
Standards of the United States