ISO 9362

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The ISO 9362 standard describes an internationally standardized code for identifying branches in payment transactions. The resulting BIC (short for B usiness I dentifier C ode / Business license plate) is worldwide in banks , brokers , bearings and similar businesses use and can each directly or indirectly participating partners clearly identified. After its original use in SWIFT payment transactions, it is also called SWIFT-BIC ; colloquially, BIC code or SWIFT code is also common; However, the correct address would be SWIFT address or BIC .

Until July 2010 the abbreviation BIC stood for “Bank Identifier Code” (bank code - in the figurative sense, bank code). If the BIC is assigned to a business operation outside the financial sector, it is also called a Business Entity Identifier . Reference is made to the BIC in ISO 13616, which describes the International Bank Account Number (IBAN).

The payment format remains undefined in payment transactions in the SWIFT network. It is therefore up to the banks involved to identify an account and to designate the transaction. When the European Payments Area (SEPA) was created, a standard was drawn up that uses IBAN and BIC to identify the payment participants. With TARGET2 , the European central banks have created a real-time gross settlement system that does not rely on the SWIFT network for clearing standardized transactions (see EBICS ). The TARGET directory lists all BICs that are connected to the TARGET2 network.

construction

The BIC has a length of 8 or 11 alphanumeric characters and the following structure:

BBBBCCLLbbb meaning
BBBB only letters 4-digit bank code, freely selectable by the financial institution
CC only letters 2-digit country code according to ISO 3166-1
LL Letters / numbers 2-digit coding of the location in two characters.

The first character must not be the number "0" or "1". If the second character is not a letter but a number, this means:

0 - it is a test BIC
1 - it is a passive SWIFT participant
2 - the recipient pays the transaction costs

The letter 'O' is not permitted as a second character.

bbb Letters / numbers 3-digit identification (branch code) of the branch or department (optional)

An 8-digit BIC can be supplemented with “XXX” to make an 11-digit one, correspondingly “XXX” can also be omitted, other codes cannot. The branch code cannot start with “X” unless it is “XXX”.

SWIFT members (banks) can register for non-SWIFT members (z. B. large industrial enterprises) at SWIFT an equally structured code that then AT ( B usiness E ntity I dentifier is called). A typical field of application are online applications by companies in order to display the customer's actual account data and also to be able to make automatic cash payments with the respective bank. Companies that have been directly connected to SWIFT for some time now also receive a BEI as SWIFT participants . The different naming has no influence on the function of the code of the respective SWIFT participant.

Advantages of the BIC

The use of BICs in an interbank order ( SWIFT message ) via SWIFT facilitates automatic further processing, as a BIC can be converted into the internal bank identification at every institution with the appropriate software ( straight through processing ), even if it is a passive SWIFT Participant acts. On the other hand, the full SWIFT addresses of a bank have to be interpreted manually. To this end, SWIFT regularly publishes, currently monthly, a BIC directory with information on new entries, changes and deletions.

use

The BIC is the international bank code of a payment service provider. Although the IBAN also clearly defines the payment service provider, the BIC had to be specified in addition to the IBAN for cross-border SEPA payments by February 2016; It was no longer required in domestic SEPA payment transactions since February 2014.

Examples

  • The SWIFT-BIC BELADEBEXXX is assigned to the Berliner Sparkasse . This belongs to the Berliner Landesbank (BE LA) in Germany (DE) with headquarters in Berlin (BE).
  • The SWIFT-BIC RBOSGGSX is assigned to the Natwest Offshore Bank on the Channel Island of Guernsey in Great Britain , but their accounts are similar to the IBAN GB45NWBK12345678901234.
  • The SWIFT-BIC CHASGB2LXXX is assigned to JPMorgan Chase Bank in London, Great Britain .
  • The SWIFT-BIC RZTIAT22263 is assigned to the Raiffeisenbank Kitzbühel ( bank code : 36263) in Austria.
  • The SWIFT-BIC BCEELULL is assigned to the “Banque et Caisse d'Epargne de l'Etat” in Luxembourg.
  • The SWIFT-BIC MARKDEFF (or MARKDEFFXXX) is assigned to the headquarters of the Deutsche (DE) Bundesbank (MARK) in Frankfurt am Main (FF).
  • The SWIFT-BIC GENODEF1JEV is assigned to the Volksbank Jever . It is located in the German (DE) Association of Genossenschaftsbanken (GENO) and is a passive SWIFT participant (1), i.e. without a direct connection to the SWIFT system.
  • The SWIFT-BIC UBSWCHZH80A is assigned to the Swiss bank UBS AG.
  • The SWIFT-BIC CEDELULLXXX is assigned to Clearstream Banking SA in Luxembourg.
  • The SWIFT-BIC HELADEF1RRS is assigned to the Rhön-Rennsteig-Sparkasse. Since she is a passive SWIFT participant, z. B. Transactions only accepted with the 8-digit HELADEFF code from the superordinate Landesbank Hessen-Thüringen.
  • The SWIFT-BIC GENODEF1S04 is assigned to Sparda-Bank München eG. It is therefore also a passive SWIFT participant.

Inadequacies

In contrast to SWIFT, which allocates the BIC, the national bodies for assigning the IBAN did not adhere to the definitions of ISO 3166-1 . This has resulted in a small number of banks in the IBAN area where the country codes in BIC and IBAN differ from one another.

Online banking systems that require the identity of the two country codes do not reach the entire IBAN area.

The largest group of countries with different country codes in BIC and IBAN are the French overseas territories, which have their own country codes in ISO-3166-1, while the IBANs all start with FR. These exceptions are noted in the notes of the IBAN registry for France and the respective overseas territory.

The two Channel Islands of Guernsey and Jersey have the peculiarity of different country codes and the complication that every bank can choose the clearing house in France or in the United Kingdom. The country selected by the clearing house determines the country code in the IBAN. Consequently, the following combinations are theoretically all possible:

ISO-3166-1 IBAN country code
JE GB
JE FR
GG GB
GG FR

The determination of the country code according to the country of the clearing house is not always adhered to. The clearing house for Greenland (GL) is in Denmark (DK), but the IBANs still start with GL. They belong to the "standard" countries with no country code difference between BIC and IBAN.

Ambiguous test BICs: BICs that differ only in the last digit of the two-digit location code LL can no longer be distinguished in the test. The distinction between active and passive SWIFT participants is also lost in the test.

Ambiguous BIC: the number 0 = zero can easily be confused with the letter O.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Swift.com: IBAN Registry. Release 67 - June 2016 (PDF; 1001 kB).