credit transfers

This is a popular method of payment in much of Western Europe but has yet to find a wide audience in the UK. A person wishing to pay a sum of money to another person can, if he or she knows the details of the beneficiary's bank branch and account number,go into a branch of any bank and complete a form crediting the beneficiary's account with that sum. if the credit has to go to another bank or branch,the form used is a bank giro credit. This seems very simple but one problem is that the form is sometimes incorrectly completed,so that it is impossible to trace the beneficiary. Customers and others are therefore strongly encouraged to use slips pre-printed by the bank or the beneficiary. Examples of these can be found at the food of every gas,electricity and telephone bill,and some organizations, eg hire purchase companies and local authority rent departments, provide their borrowers and tenants with pre-printed books of bank giro credits. The banks process the transactions,as we shall see later,and subsequently credit the beneficiary's account. However,the beneficiaries may not be advised of the receipt until they read their statements because the receiving bank assumes that the advice was sent by the person making the payment. Even if this is the case,the advice notice does not always specify the date on which payment will be made.
Credits transferred electronically are a major part of Internet and direct banking.payment details of regular bills are held by the bank and customers trigger these,often adding the amount to be paid via an Internet or telephone connection with the bank. A development of the bank giro system, using electronic methods of funds transfer,is BACS .it is available to large organizations with their own computers.