Prying Systems and Society
Paying in Singapore means choosing from a long list of apps and interfaces. You can scan a QR code, tap a card on a NETS terminal, set up a GIRO arrangement or even post a cheque. Every bank has its own app, and newer ones like GrabPay and ShopeePay add more. Behind each one, the money takes a different route, and consumers are left to work out the differences for themselves.
Underlying all these payment channels are a handful of names that most Singaporeans will recognise:
PayNow Pay by phone number Sits on top of FAST and GIRO and finds the account for you. Operated by 
BCS 
FAST Send money in seconds Instant transfers between banks, day or night. Operated by BCS 
GIRO Bills and salaries Recurring and bulk payments, in batches that can take days. Operated by BCS 
NETS Pay by debit card or QR A separate network owned by the three largest banks. Operated by 
MEPS+ Where banks settle up Run by the central bank, where banks pay what they owe. Operated by MAS Together they make up Singapore’s everyday payments stack. This piece follows the money through each channel, party by party.
S$1.8T
Moved through FAST, GIRO and SGD cheques in 2025. All three clear together and settle at MAS
MAS statistics 2025
S$301B
Counted through PayNow in 2025. It rides on FAST, GIRO and same-bank transfers, not a rail of its own
MAS and ABS report 2025
S$51K 
The average SGD cheque in 2025, against about S$1,240 on FAST and S$5,740 on GIRO
MAS statistics 2025
3institutions 
MAS lists them as settling designated payment systems. Only one is the central bank itself
MAS directory Oct 2026
A payee usually gets the money or an approval first, and the banks settle with each other later.
Settles at MAS, in central bank moneySettles at a commercial bankSettles inside one bankSettlement not documented
How to read this
Pick a route or a box above. The stack covers everyday payments in Singapore. ATM networks, non-bank remittance firms and e-wallet licensing are outside it. Who owns each part is in the ownership piece.
Boxes with a dashed outline mark something the sources read do not establish in full.
Path of this payment
Good to know
Visa and Mastercard carry the sale on their own networks, not over FAST or the NETS network.
Not in the public record No current source names the Singapore dollar settlement bank for either scheme. MAS acts as the settlement agent for banks, moving Singapore dollars between their accounts in MEPS+. The 2011 description of signature debit cards runs end-of-day transfers between issuer and acquirer through Interbank GIRO, whose net files settle there.
Read next How stablecoins are entering card payments follows one card tap from authorisation to payout. Who owns and runs the rails shows who owns each step in Singapore.
Path of this payment
Good to know
ABS rules bar merchants from surcharging PayNow (MAS reply, 14 October 2025).
Read next Who owns and runs the rails follows the same scan step by step.
Path of this payment
Good to know
MAS’s directory names DBS Bank as the settlement institution today.
Not in the public record This flow follows the 2011 description. No current source gives the message flow or the netting method.
Read next Who owns and runs the rails follows the same tap step by step.
Path of this payment
Good to know
A PayNow-only app may not pay on NETS QR today. MAS and ABS aim to pilot interoperability by the end of 2026.
Not in the public record NETS acts as the acquirer, not a settlement bank. No source read says how the paying bank funds NETS, or which bank or system finally settles NETS QR payments.
Read next Who owns and runs the rails follows the same scan step by step.
Path of this payment
Good to know
Apps can scan other overseas QR schemes too, as DBS’s PayLah! overseas page shows.
Not in the public record No source read says how these payments clear or settle between NETS and the other country’s scheme. The launch releases for Malaysia and Indonesia name no settlement bank. PayNet’s developer documentation describes a cross-border settlement bank and a local settlement bank for DuitNow QR by role only. The Singapore side is not published for any link. No volume figure turned up for these links, and no source read ties the other schemes to them.
Path of this payment
Good to know
About 64% of adult commuters used the SimplyGo system in December 2023, and close to 70% by late January 2024. That is the latest figure in the sources read.
Not in the public record How SimplyGo settles with the card networks and splits fares between operators is not published.
Read next The card leg is the same tap that How stablecoins are entering card payments follows from authorisation to payout.
Path of this payment
Good to know
A transfer between two accounts at the same bank skips FAST.
Not in the public record The current number of settlement cycles is not confirmed. The World Bank study gave two a day in 2021.
Read next Who owns and runs the rails follows the same transfer step by step.
Path of this payment
Good to know
This is why not every SGD payment reaches MEPS+. Only obligations between banks do.
Path of this payment
Good to know
DBS Remit sends 19 currencies to over 50 destinations with no transfer fee, the same day. Outward telegraphic transfer reaches more destinations, takes 2 to 4 working days and can add agent bank charges.
Not in the public record How DBS Remit is routed, and which correspondent banks each Singapore bank uses, is not described in the sources read.
Path of this payment
Not in the public record Which non-banks settle through a sponsor is as of the 2021 World Bank study and has not been rechecked.
Path of this payment
Good to know
The three live corridors carried about S$371 million in 2025 (Gen2 report).
Not in the public record Only the PromptPay link has a published settlement design, from 2022. For UPI, Axis Bank is named as settlement bank for one sender’s remittances. For DuitNow, the ABS fact sheet says nothing on settlement.
Path of this payment
Good to know
A station takes cards and PayNow QR. AXS Web adds eNETS and PayLah!. AXS says it is not the biller’s agent.
Not in the public record The rail AXS uses to pay billers is not published.
Path of this payment
Good to know
This is a pull. The biller starts the payment, within the terms you authorised.
Path of this payment
Good to know
GIRO is a push for credits. It settles the same way as FAST, only in a batch.
Read next Who owns and runs the rails follows the same payroll step by step.
Path of this payment
Good to know
Corporate cheques stop processing from 1 January 2027 (ABS).
Read next Who owns and runs the rails follows the same cheque step by step.
Path of this payment
Good to know
EDP and EDP+ replace post-dated cheques and cashier’s orders (ABS).
Where you pay
The bank app is where most bank-rail payments start. Each bank builds its own, such as DBS digibank, OCBC’s app and UOB TMRW. It takes the customer’s instruction and hands it to the bank’s systems.
Why it matters
The app is where a sender makes the last check before a payment leaves the bank, such as the partly masked payee name shown for a PayNow payment.
Key facts
Where you pay
Wallet apps hold stored value or link to a bank account. Some are run by banks and some by non-banks, and they reach PayNow and QR payments in different ways.
Why it matters
Non-bank wallets reach FAST through a settlement agent. The World Bank study says participating banks settle for the non-banks that join, so a wallet’s access to central bank money depends on its sponsor bank.
Key facts
Where you pay
AXS is a bill payment platform with kiosks, an app and a web portal. It takes the customer’s payment and passes it to the biller, so billers deal with AXS and not with each payment scheme.
Why it matters
One AXS screen sits on four payment paths, cards, PayNow QR, eNETS and PayLah!. The biller sees a single payout from AXS, whichever path the customer chose.
Key facts
Not in the public record The sources read do not name the bank or processor behind AXS’s card acceptance.
Where you pay
Every terminal has an acquirer behind it. The acquirer is the party that receives the sale for the merchant, and it decides which networks the terminal can reach.
Why it matters
A merchant’s choice of acquirer decides which brands it takes and how it is paid. NETS now offers one contract that covers three brands.
Key facts
Where you pay
A billing organisation collects or pays money by instruction rather than by card, such as an employer paying staff or a utility collecting a bill. It sends a file of instructions through its bank.
Why it matters
A GIRO debit is a pull. The arrangement is tripartite between the billing organisation, the customer and the bank, so the biller starts the payment and the customer’s bank follows the authorisation the customer gave.
Key facts
Where you pay
The transit gate is the reader at an MRT gantry or on a bus. The party behind it is SimplyGo, which is owned by LTA and is the exclusive acquirer for public transport.
Why it matters
Transit is the one everyday card payment charged after the fact. A retail tap is authorised for one sale. A transit tap becomes a batched charge listed as BUS/MRT, which is why a statement shows a combined amount.
Key facts
Not in the public record SimplyGo’s settlement arrangement with the card networks is not published. It is not named on Visa’s public list of Singapore acquirers.
How you pay
A proxy is a mobile number, NRIC or FIN, UEN or virtual payment address registered to one bank account. The sender types the proxy and never needs the account number.
Why it matters
The directory is what makes PayNow a network. With more than 90% of adults registered, a mobile number works as an address for most payees.
Key facts
How you pay
SGQR is a single QR sticker that can carry several payment schemes. It is a display standard, and the label itself moves no money.
Why it matters
A shared label is not shared acceptance. The Gen2 report says SGQR does not by itself enable interoperability between payment schemes. One sticker can work in one app and fail in another.
Key facts
How you pay
The card or token is what the customer presents. The brand on it decides which network handles the payment.
Why it matters
The brand picks the rail, and a phone wallet does not change it. The sale itself travels on the card’s own network, not over FAST or the shared clearing house.
Key facts
How you pay
Account details are the plain way to address a payment, the payee’s name and bank account number.
Why it matters
Paying to an account number needs no registry, so it needs no registration. PayNow adds the registry so the sender never has to know the number.
Key facts
Not in the public record No central directory of account numbers is described in the sources read, and none describes how a sender’s bank checks an account number before it sends.
How you pay
A cheque is a paper instruction to the payer’s bank to pay the payee. The payee deposits it at their own bank.
Why it matters
The corporate cheque is being retired, and EDP and EDP+ are the replacements. The cheque lane is shrinking toward retail use.
Key facts
How you pay
eNETS is NETS’s online payment gateway. It lets a customer pay a merchant by debiting a bank account through internet banking.
Why it matters
eNETS pays from a bank account at checkout without a card. No source read says which rail moves the money.
Key facts
Not in the public record NETS’s eNETS page, Standard Chartered’s eNETS page and the 2011 Red Book describe what the customer does, not how an eNETS payment clears and settles between the bank, NETS and the merchant.
Whose product
PayNow is a naming layer, not a rail. MAS and ABS class it as an overlay service. It turns a proxy into an account, then sends the payment over FAST for real-time payments up to S$200,000, or over Interbank GIRO for batched, scheduled or recurring ones.
Why it matters
PayNow’s S$301 billion counts FAST, GIRO and same-bank transfers, so it is not FAST volume. FAST’s own total for 2025 was S$798 billion.
Key facts
Whose product
Singapore’s schemes reach other countries in two separate ways. PayNow sends transfers to a phone number abroad. NETS QR lets a customer scan a merchant’s code abroad.
Key facts
Not in the public record Only the PromptPay transfer link has a published settlement design. In the 2022 white paper, DBS and Bangkok Bank settle twice a day through accounts the banks hold with them. For UPI, Axis Bank is named as settlement bank for one sender’s remittances. For DuitNow transfers, the ABS fact sheet says nothing on settlement. For the QR links, the Bank of Thailand named Krungthai Bank as settlement bank for Thailand and Singapore at the 2021 launch. Nothing is published for the Malaysia and Indonesia QR links, and Indonesia’s planned local currency settlement is unconfirmed.
Whose product
NETS QR is NETS’s own QR scheme. It shares the SGQR label with PayNow but is a separate scheme with its own acquirer.
Why it matters
The app, not the sticker, picks the rail. The same sticker works in PayLah! and may fail in a PayNow-only app until the pilot.
Key facts
Not in the public record No source read describes how the paying bank’s money reaches NETS or how QR payments are netted. MAS’s list of designated systems names NETS EFTPOS, not NETS QR (MAS).
Whose product
EDP and EDP+ are ABS products that replace post-dated cheques (EDP) and cashier’s orders (EDP+). They are scheduled payments that ride on GIRO, clearing and settling as GIRO items.
Why it matters
Because they ride on GIRO, deferred payments follow GIRO’s batch timing and not FAST’s real-time clock.
Key facts
Whose product
NETS EFTPOS is Singapore’s national PIN debit scheme. NETS runs it end to end as scheme operator, processor and acquirer, and the banks are its participants and issuers.
Why it matters
It is one of two designated systems that settle at a commercial bank. The other is the US dollar cheque system, at Citibank. MAS’s directory lists only three settlement institutions, MAS, DBS and Citibank.
Key facts
Whose product
Visa and Mastercard are the international card schemes. Each sets its own rules for Singapore issuers and acquirers.
Why it matters
Foreign-owned rules reach into a local standard. The SGQR clauses mean Visa and Mastercard help decide how a Singapore QR label is accepted.
Key facts
How it travels
FAST is Singapore’s real-time account-to-account rail. It credits the payee in seconds, around the clock, and the banks settle with each other later.
Why it matters
The payee is credited before the banks settle, so until the next settlement cycle banks carry credit exposure to each other. MAS holds collateral against it, and a participant whose collateral falls short is cut off.
Key facts
How it travels
Interbank GIRO is the batch rail for scheduled and recurring payments. The payer pushes a credit, and a billing organisation pulls a debit.
Why it matters
The average GIRO payment is S$5,700, more than four times the S$1,250 average on FAST. The older batch rail carries the larger recurring and bulk payments.
Key facts
How it travels
The Cheque Truncation System clears cheques as images. It handles SGD and USD cheques.
Why it matters
US dollar cheques settle at a commercial bank and not at MAS. Participating banks hold US dollar accounts at Citibank for that purpose.
Key facts
How it travels
The NETS network carries NETS EFTPOS transactions between the terminal, NETS and the issuing bank.
Why it matters
NETS authorises in real time, so what is netted later is each bank’s net position and not each sale.
Key facts
Not in the public record No current source describes the message flow. None describes how the issuer-to-NETS leg of NETS QR travels.
How it travels
VisaNet and the Mastercard network are the schemes’ own networks. They carry authorisation and clearing for Visa and Mastercard cards.
Why it matters
MEPS+ speaks Swift message formats. The card rulebooks do not mention Swift, so card traffic is a separate messaging world from the one MAS settles in.
Key facts
How it travels
An overseas bank transfer travels as a Swift message from bank to bank. Correspondent banks, which hold accounts for each other, move the money.
Why it matters
Every bank on the way can take a fee. Under the shared (SHA) and beneficiary (BEN) options, intermediary and beneficiary bank fees come out of the amount sent, so the recipient can receive less than you sent.
Key facts
Not in the public record The sources read do not name the correspondent banks Singapore banks use, or how Singapore dollar legs reach MEPS+. They also do not say which currency a transfer passes through on the way.
Who owes whom
The Automated Clearing House is where FAST, Interbank GIRO and cheque items are netted. It sends the net files to MEPS+ for settlement.
Why it matters
FAST, GIRO and cheques share one operator and one route to MEPS+, so they share a point of failure. BCS also runs PayNow and the SGQR repository.
Key facts
Not in the public record The current number of FAST settlement cycles was not confirmed. The World Bank study put it at two a day in 2021 and noted a plan for more.
Who owes whom
NETS processing works out what each member bank owes or is owed for NETS debit.
Why it matters
NETS nets its own flows and does not use the shared clearing house. That is why NETS has a separate path.
Key facts
Not in the public record That description dates from 2011. No current source gives the netting method, and none covers NETS QR.
Who owes whom
Visa and Mastercard each run their own clearing. It works out what each bank owes or is owed.
Why it matters
Card clearing is run by the schemes, not by the Singapore clearing house, so card sales are not netted with FAST, GIRO and cheque items.
Key facts
Where money moves
MEPS+ is MAS’s real-time gross settlement system, where banks settle in central bank money. Every domestic bank rail that settles at MAS ends here.
Why it matters
The stack gets heavier toward the bottom. The Gen2 report puts the average payment at S$420 on PayNow, S$1,250 on FAST and S$5,700 on GIRO, against a typical S$200,000 or more on MEPS+. MEPS+ settles banks’ net positions and large transfers, not individual retail payments.
Key facts
Where money moves
A commercial bank, not MAS, settles NETS EFTPOS. MAS’s directory names it.
Why it matters
The settlement bank is also an owner. NETS is equally owned by the three largest banks, and DBS reported owning 33.33% of it in 2010. In that description, MEPS+ funds the accounts at DBS and does not settle the NETS debit payments themselves.
Key facts
Not in the public record How the net positions are calculated and moved day to day today is not documented.
Where money moves
A transfer between two accounts at the same bank is a book entry inside that bank. The payment does not need the clearing house or MEPS+.
Why it matters
The central bank takes no part in a same-bank payment. The Gen2 report still counts these intra-participant transfers inside PayNow’s value.
Key facts
Where money moves
A sponsor bank settles on behalf of non-banks that join FAST. It is how central bank money reaches a wallet or payment firm.
Why it matters
A non-bank’s access to FAST depends on its sponsor. If the sponsor’s collateral falls short, the sponsor is cut off, and the non-banks behind it go with it.
Key facts
Not in the public record The collateral amounts and the bilateral terms between a non-bank and its sponsor were not found in the sources read.
Where money moves
Card scheme settlement is where Visa and Mastercard obligations are paid between banks.
Why it matters
This is the one lane that carries Visa and Mastercard, and it is where the stack cannot say who holds the final claim.
Key facts
Not in the public record No current source names a Singapore dollar settlement bank for either scheme.
Where money moves
AXS and SimplyGo collect money from customers and pay it on to billers and transport operators. Both are major payment institutions.
Why it matters
In both cases the customer pays an intermediary, and the intermediary pays the end recipient later. That timing gap sits with a licensed payment institution, which is why MAS’s safeguarding rules apply to AXS.
Key facts
Not in the public record No source read names the safeguarding institution or the rail either collector uses to pay out, or says how fare revenue is split between operators.
MAS names the settlement institution for each system it designates. Most other routes have no published settlement detail.
Settles at MAS, in central bank money
FAST FAST ISO 20022 Clearing house Run by BCS MEPS+ Net files from FAST, GIRO and SGD cheques. MAS is the settlement institution. Interbank GIRO GIRO ISO 20022 Clearing house Run by BCS MEPS+ EDP and EDP+ GIRO As GIRO Clearing house Run by BCS MEPS+ Settles at a commercial bank
NETS debit NETS network PIN auth NETS netting A net position per bank DBS books Named by MAS. Member banks fund their accounts there through MEPS+ (2011). Overseas bank transfer Swift Swift message Settles inside one bank
Settles under scheme or partner arrangements
Visa or Mastercard Card networks VisaNet, Mastercard Scheme messages Banks not named Neither rulebook names the SGD bank. Between banks, SGD settles in MEPS+. NETS QR NETS network Over SGQR labels EMVCo QR NETS QR overseas NETS QR link To PromptPay QR, DuitNow QR or QRIS PayNow overseas PayNow link To PromptPay, UPI or DuitNow Typical payment size by system
A typical MEPS+ payment is at least 475 times the average PayNow payment.
PayNow FAST Interbank GIRO SGD cheque MEPS+ Log scale. Each gridline is ten times the one before.
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