Employees, don’t be in a hurry. Because this month, your pay could well arrive a few days late. And for good reason, the Target 2 system, which allows you to send money free of charge from one account to another in the form of a SEPA transfer, will be closed from Friday March 29 to Monday April 1 inclusive.
In use since 1999, Target 2 actually closes every weekend. This is why the time required for a transfer made on a Friday or Saturday is around 72 hours, compared to one day on a weekday. But these payment settlement systems also go into standby “on certain public holidays”. Like New Year’s Day, Labor Day, Christmas, December 26, or even Good Friday in the areas concerned (Moselle, Bas-Rhin and Haut-Rhin for France, and Portugal, Spain, Italy, Germany in Europe).
2024: a calendar specificity
This is also the case every year during the “long Easter weekend”, specifies the French Banking Federation (FBF) in a press release published this Monday March 25. This year, however, has a small specificity: the Easter weekend falls at the end of the month, “period for receiving salaries”, explains FBF, which aims to be reassuring: companies would be up to date with Target’s closure schedules.
This is thanks to strong communication carried out by banking institutions: European Central Bank (ECB), clearing houses, French Committee for Banking Organization and Standardization (CFONB), and even commercial banks. All have warned the various economic players in advance by communicating to them the FBF timetable.
Companies, well informed
“We can therefore think that companies have taken the necessary anticipation measures for the transfer orders planned during this closure period, in particular salaries, so that the latter are processed taking into account this prolonged closure period,” estimates the Banking Federation. To meet the deadlines, companies will have to initiate bank transfers no later than this Wednesday, March 27. Failing this, employees’ bank accounts should be supplemented by April 4 at the latest.
Please note that both working days and public holidays, instant transfers, free in certain banking establishments, remain operational. This, including “during periods when settlement systems are closed”, indicates the representative body. As well as internal transfers from a payer to a payer, customers of the same bank. In short, “only interbank transfers are impacted”, summarizes the Federation of French Banks.