With the objective of maintaining a common platform for the settlements of electronic retail fund transfers in the country, the Central Bank of Sri Lanka (CBSL) has recommended the establishment of the Common Card and Payment Switch (CCAPS) and appointed LankaPay (Pvt.) Ltd. (LCPL) to set up, administer and operate CCAPS, which is a network of interoperable switches (i.e. Common ATM Switch, Common POS Switch, Common EFT Switch, Common Mobile Switch and Shared ATM Switch) collectively incorporating a common trade name/brand name and logo in the country as "LankaPay". CCAPS has been designated by the Monetary Board of CBSL as the National Payment Switch, which will facilitate the real-time communication and processing of payment orders and other messages, effecting, ordering, enabling, authorizing and facilitating interbank fund transfers and ATM transactions amongst LankaPay members.
The Common ATM Switch (CAS) which is the Phase I of CCAPS is referred as “LankaPay - CAS”. It links all ATM switches of the LankaPay - CAS Members to facilitate domestic off-us transactions originated from any ATM of a LankaPay CAS Member in a unified infrastructure to ensure seamless interoperability across LankaPay CAS members.
LCPL shall operate LankaPay - CAS in terms of the General Direction No. 01 of 2013 - Operations of the Common ATM Switch dated 31 May 2013 issued by CBSL under the provisions of the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, No.28 of 2005.
CBSL guidance to charge only Rs 30/= (including taxes) for withdrawal and Balance inquiry Rs 7.50/=
Clearing cycle 1 –> 02:00:01 pm – 07:00:00 am
Clearing cycle 2 -> 07:00:01 am – 10.00:00 am
Clearing cycle 3 -> 10:00:01 am – 12.00:00 am
Clearing cycle 4 -> 12:00:01 pm – 02.00:00 pm
LankaPay-CAS will take LankaPay - CAS Members to the next level of the financial payment industry and will enable the enhancement of the services offered to their cardholders. Such as;
1. Cash withdrawals from any LankaPay - CAS Member ATM
Any cardholder of a LankaPay - CAS Member could withdraw cash from any ATM linked to LankaPay-CAS, which will act as a routing point where an Acquirer's request will be routed through the LankaPay-CAS to the Issuer’s switch. Upon the receipt of a successful response from the switch of the Issuer the cardholder can withdraw cash.
2. Balance inquiry option to cardholders from any ATM
Any cardholder of a LankaPay - CAS Member could get a printout or view the balance of his/her account from any ATM linked to LankaPay-CAS, which will act as a routing point where the Acquirer’s request will be routed through the LankaPay-CAS to the Issuer's switch. Upon the successful response from the switch of the Issuer the cardholder can view or get a print out of the balance of his/her account.
3. 24 x 7 service provider.
LankaPay-CAS will provide 365 day 24x7 services to the LankaPay - CAS Members, through the infrastructure & network of LCPL. Such service continuity will be minimum 99.8% and the Disaster Recovery (DR) center of LankaPay-CAS shall be available 24x365.
4. Less transaction cost to LankaPay - CAS Members and for the end user cardholder
With the introduction of LankaPay-CAS, the transaction cost has reduced considerably. This will create the platform for higher volumes of not-on-us domestic payment card transactions and will also save a considerable amount of foreign exchange moving out of the country.
CAS Quarterly Statistics