To facilitate safe, secured and efficient interbank payment system, Bangladesh Bank launched Real Time Gross Settlement (BD-RTGS) system on 29th October 2015 as part of its inclusive digitalization initiative. BD-RTGS opened a new horizon in the payment ecosystem, accommodating instant settlement of large value and time critical payments in the country. RTGS is an electronic settlement system where transfer of funds takes place from one account of a bank to that of another bank on a real-time and on gross basis. Real-time refers transactions that do not need any waiting period. Transactions are settled as soon as they are executed. Needless to say that minimum limit of a transaction is BDT 1, 00,000 whereas there is no limit in case of government payment.

Currently, RTGS system is operating only in local currency inside the country. Domestic foreign currency transactions are expected to be launched soon. Replacing paper based transaction system; RTGS system is becoming more popular day by day. It is worthwhile to mention that more than 11000 online branches of 59 scheduled banks are currently connected to this system. Bengal Commercial Bank Limited has been added into RTGS system since 9th September 2021; where as Citizens Bank PLC will be added soon. From 4th April, 2021 BD-RTGS System has started its operation from Near Data Centre (NDC) situated at Bangladesh Bank Training Academy (BBTA). Transaction number during February-April 2022 is 1,816,498 with the volume of 1,155,124 crore taka while 1,621,391 transactions with the volume of 866,245 crore taka during November-January 2021.

The system is currently allowed to handle lots of lucrative features including VAT Online Payment, Customs Duty E-Payment and Automated Challan System (ACS) etc. Along with these individual interbank transactions, there is an option to settle all other Deferred Net Settlement Batches (DNSB) such as BACPS, BEFTN or NPSB through RTGS system. BD-RTGS is also linked to BB core banking solution. Bangladesh Bank has provided a participating module to the entire schedule bank for seamless communication between BB-RTGS and the participants. An in-depth realization is that, RTGS system may impact an immense change in the financial sector and set up an epoch-making example in the arena of Bangladesh economy.

Trend of the transactions with RTGS is shown below: