Payments Canada's payments revolution

Canadians will soon enter a new era in payments where they’ll gain instant access to their money and fund transfers without delay. Deloitte is playing a pivotal role in supporting Payments Canada’s Real-Time Rail (RTR) initiative—a transformative, large-scale program set to modernize how Canadians move their money as part of the organization's mandate to ensure that financial transactions in Canada are carried out safely and securely.

“In early 2023, Payments Canada began work, strongly supported by regulators in the financial services industry, to deliver on a transformative national real-time rail system that would enable instant, secure, and data-rich payments for consumers and businesses across the country,” says Partner Todd Roberts with the Strategy, Risk & Transactions team at Deloitte. “This system will modernize how Canadians move their money and bring us up to speed with global standards.”

According to Payments Canada’s 2024 Canadian Methods and Trends report, the support is also present from 60% of Canadians who indicate they want to send or receive payments in real-time. People will gain more control over their finances by making it easier to manage cash flow, avoid late fees, handle time-sensitive transactions, and greater confidence that payments are finalized. The RTR will also benefit the economy, adding an estimated $3 billion in efficiency gains over the first five years^[1].

Deloitte augmented the Payments Canada Program Team, supported the development of an integrated RTR Program Plan across 15 workstreams, six vendors, and multiple industry stakeholders. Through more than 25 facilitated sessions, Deloitte laid the groundwork for effective program delivery. The team also provided actionable insights and independent observations, launched cross-functional forums for efficient decision-making and developed dashboards to monitor quality assurance and operational readiness.

“As the needs and behaviours of Canadians shift, so too does the way they pay and get paid. To meet these evolving demands, Payments Canada is working closely with industry stakeholders and members to modernize our national payment infrastructure and ensure global competitiveness,” says Director of Industry Relations, Rondev Bhattacharya, with Payments Canada.

A standout feature of the RTR is its centralized fraud mitigation. Deloitte helped to articulate the core fraud functionality, working with key ecosystem participants, and supported the development of the foundational RTR fraud policy and rules that underpins the centralized fraud capability. Canada will become one of the first countries in the world to embed these capabilities from day one.

Ultimately, Canadians are the biggest winners—gaining faster, safer, and more flexible payment options that will support everyday needs and drive economic growth. This work is one way Deloitte is supporting greater public confidence in our financial systems.

1 C.D. Howe, The need for speed: The benefits of faster payments and how to achieve them (2023)