Real-Time Account Verification (AVS-R)
Real-Time Account Verification (AVS-R) is a service that allows you to verify, in real time, the account information and status of a customer account held at a different bank. This operation is often performed prior to making a payment or loading a beneficiary to a banking profile.
AVS-R transactions have no financial impact themselves, but are useful for checking that a beneficiary’s or debtor’s details are correct before initiating a financially impacting transaction such as a credit transfer or a debit payment.
AVS-R transactions are processed via BankservAfrica. Electrum can process both inbound and outbound AVS-R transactions between a bank and BankservAfrica. For inbound transactions (that is, where the bank receives and processes a request for account validation of one of their own customers), Electrum can also perform all necessary account validation on behalf of the core banking system, using the Electrum Account Mirror.
Account Mirror
Electrum’s Account Mirror service helps our clients to authorise inbound payments. Electrum will host a mirror of your account database. In the case of an incoming (to you) AVS-R request, Electrum can check the validity of a beneficiary account on your behalf and respond directly to the network. This takes network traffic and processing load away from your customer accounts system.
The Account Mirror must be kept up to date, so you must inform Electrum of any changes made to your account database. See the AVS-R Account Management page for more details.
If you do not wish to use the Electrum Account Mirror, then you must be able to support customer account validations.
Processing AVS-R Transactions
Account validation is performed in two steps at the account holder’s bank:
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A check is performed to determine whether the account exists and is active.
- If the account does not exist or is not active, then a negative response is returned to the initiating bank without validation of any further parameters.
- If the account is active, then a series of checks on the account is performed, as shown below.
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Other parameters are checked, such as whether:
- The account is older than three months.
- Debits and/or credits are allowed.
- The account type matches what was specified in the request.
- The organisation identification matches what was specified in the request (if the account owner is an organisation).
- The trust identification matches what was specified in the request (if the account owner is a trust).
- The account holder’s first initial, name, mobile number, and email address match the values stipulated in the request (if the account owner is a natural person).
The AVS-R response message will indicate a TRUE/FALSE/NOT_CHECKED result for each check performed.
A result of NOT_CHECKED is indicated where:
- The account is closed
- A field was not populated in the request