Singapore and Thailand Link National Payment Infrastructures

In a world-first, the two countries have established a link between Singapore’s PayNow and Thailand’s equivalent PromptPay.

Customers in Singapore with DBS, OCBC, and UOB accounts, and customers of Bangkok Bank, Kasikorn Bank, Krung Thai Bank, and Siam Commercial Bank in Thailand will be able to securely perform cross-border peer-to-peer transactions of up to S$1,000 or THB25,000 using just their mobile numbers.

The transactions will take place at the near real-time speed at a fee that is competitive to remittance services. Over time, participating banks and use cases will be scaled up and expanded, the Association of Banks in Singapore said in an announcement on Thursday.

Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and the Bank of Thailand first mooted the possibility of a link between their respective countries’ networks in 2017.  The announcement said the two sides spent the past few years working to align their target operating model, business rules, technical connectivity as well as legal framework.

Wee Ee Cheong, ABS chairman, deputy chairman and CEO of UOB, said the initiative is also «an important step to connecting payment systems across ASEAN at scale in the future.

MAS managing director Ravi Menon previously said MAS is keen to help other central banks in the region to expand the linkage, so that more people across Southeast Asia can benefit.