Confusion over Funding Date as NACHA Prepares to Disburse Economic Impact Payments

By Talia Koe 2 years ago
ACH Network Prepared to Deliver Economic Impact Payments to Americans Via Direct Deposit

The Clearing House Payments Co.,  NACHA, and more than half a dozen banking and payment unions hastened to correct the government’s release date for the Economic Impact Payments.

The notice from the nine groups and an exclusive statement from Nacha, the supervising body for the ACH network, sought to set the record straight after posts on social media platforms and the press showed that the funds would have been ready by the first weekend of March.

NACHA’s statement said the Automated Clearing House was to initiate and settle the economic impact payments to banking institutions and credit unions by Wed, March 17, per the Internal Revenue Service’s guidelines. 

The funds will be available for eligible taxpayers by 9:00 am, as stipulated under NACHA rules. As for Round One and Two of the federal government’s economic impact payments, the supervisor estimated the count of direct deposits would touch around 100 million.

The viral rumors claimed that payments would be ready as early as the first weekend of March, causing some turmoil online when this failed to happen.  Furthermore, some competitor banks issued advances to eligible users with digital wallets, hoping to recover their share once the government disbursed funds. This misinformation caused general confusion about the availability of the funds.

According to Jane Larimer, the network’s president, the ACH platform showed its ability to process tens of millions of payments beyond its per-day volume of over 100 million transactions. Approximately 27 billion ACH transactions worth $62 trillion were processed in 2020 under past funding programs, NACHA says.

According to the IRS,  the economic impact payments happened as follows Under the CARES Act:

  • 122.5 million transactions through direct deposit, 
  • 38.5 million via check, 
  • 3.8 million through prepaid cards.

When Round Two of economic impact payments was signed in Dec, another 100 million transactions happened on Jan. 4, 2021.

Final Words

The Automated Clearing House has proved its capability to handle a surge in transactions. Throughout COVID, it has indeed helped the government distribute the much-needed funds to its citizens.

Author Bio: Michael Hollis is a Detroit native from firstamericanmerchant.com who has helped hundreds of business owners with their merchant solutions. He’s experimented with various occupations: computer programming, dog-training, accounting… But his favorite is the one he’s now doing — providing business funding for hard-working business owners across the country.