Context

Merchants enabling instant payments want to either: (1) restrict bank selection to instant-capable banks only, or (2) prefer instant but allow fallback to standard SEPA Credit. They also notice that instant coverage can change over time or differ by country (for example, Ireland and Austria), and need a reliable way to check which banks currently support SEPA Instant.

Answer

To restrict to instant-only banks, filter on the instant payment schemes returned by the banks/list API and rely on the dashboard coverage export for the latest validated support. Coverage may change as providers/banks roll out and validate Instant support; we only enable banks after successful testing to avoid failed user experiences.

1. Choose your payment behavior:

   • instant_only: show only instant-capable banks and send via SEPA Instant.

   • instant_preferred: show all banks; use SEPA Instant where available, otherwise fall back to SEPA Credit.

   • standard: show all banks and use SEPA Credit (no-cost) by default.

2. Verify current coverage in the Ivy dashboard:

   • Go to Settings › Banks and download the coverage list.

   • The export includes scheme-level support; check which banks currently list SEPA_INSTANT.

3. Understand why coverage changes:

   • Banks roll out Instant support at different times; regulatory requirements (e.g., EU Instant Payments Regulation) do not always equal immediate technical readiness.

   • Ivy enables SEPA Instant per bank only after validation. This means a bank may appear or disappear from the instant-capable list as testing outcomes change.

   • With instant_preferred, payments automatically switch to Instant once a bank upgrades support; otherwise they are processed as SEPA Credit (typically 1–3 business days).