HERNDON, Va. – In 2015, ACH transaction volume grew to more than 24 billion electronic payments, an increase of 1.3 billion payments or 5.6%, over 2014 volume, according to new statistics released by NACHA—The Electronic Payments Association.
This increase marks the second consecutive year in which ACH payments grew by more than 1 billion, NACHA reported, adding that more than $41.6 trillion was transferred over the ACH network last year, increasing 4% compared to 2014.
“The ACH network is a unique payments system providing for robust versatility with its inherent ability to process credit and debit transactions, payments and information together, domestic and international transactions, and more,” said Janet O. Estep, president and CEO of NACHA, in a statement. “It is this flexibility and adaptability that has facilitated new payments capabilities to meet the evolving needs of end users, and ultimately contributed to the network’s consistent growth. With the advent of additional capabilities, such as person-to-person payments, which was implemented in March of 2014, and same day ACH, which will become available in September, we expect to see continued growth and advancement of the network and ACH payments.”
NACHA noted a unique attribute of the ACH network is its ability to process both debit and credit transactions. In 2015, the network processed more than 11 billion debit transactions, which constitutes almost 60% of overall ACH network volume. While the volume of debit transactions demonstrates its importance and value to end users, end users are embracing credit transactions as well, with credits growing by more than 5% in 2015 to eight-billion transactions.
Other data points released by NACHA:
- In the B2B transaction categories, CTX and CCD, ACH volume saw substantial increases. CTX transactions grew by 7.2% and CCD transactions grew by 8.2%. Healthcare payments, a specific CCD transaction, grew to 208 million transactions, or 39%.
- Not only have B2B transaction categories grown, but so have transactions categories in which consumers serve as the recipient of the payment. Direct deposit via ACH – a credit transaction – is the transfer of funds from a company or government agency into an individual's checking or savings account. In 2015, the network transferred 5.8 billion direct deposits, an increase of 200 million transactions over last yet.
- P2P payments, a web/online credit transaction, saw growth as well. In its first full year of availability. P2P payments grew 670% to 57 million transactions.
- The top 50 originating depository financial institutions originated 16.8 billion ACH transactions, accounting for 87.0% of ACH network originated volume. The top 50 receiving depository financial institutions received 11.1 billion ACH transactions, accounting for 57.4% of ACH network received volume.