SEPA Instant Credit Transfer (SCT Inst) is the European Payments Council scheme for euro credit transfers that reach the payee's account within 10 seconds, at any time, on every day of the year. It uses the same IBAN-based messaging as the standard SEPA Credit Transfer without business-day cut-offs, so participants must keep liquidity available around the clock in instant settlement systems such as TIPS or RT1. The 2025 rulebook raised the scheme limit from €100,000 to €999,999,999.99. Under Regulation (EU) 2024/886, instant transfers cannot cost more than standard ones, and euro-area e-money and payment institutions must send and receive them by 9 April 2027, which makes readiness a live diligence item.
How does SCT Inst work
The payer's provider reserves the funds and sends the payment, the receiving provider checks it and credits the payee, and a confirmation returns to the payer, all within 10 seconds. The 2025 rulebook, in force since 5 October 2025, adds intermediate timeouts inside that window, and the payer's provider must notify the payer of the outcome. Because payments run at night and at weekends, participants must keep liquidity available at all times in an instant settlement system, such as the Eurosystem's TIPS or EBA CLEARING's RT1, rather than topping up once a day.
Is there a SEPA instant limit
Until October 2025 the scheme maximum was €100,000 per payment. The 2025 rulebook raised it to €999,999,999.99, which in practice removes the scheme cap. Individual providers still set their own limits by customer type and risk appetite.
Instant Payments Regulation deadlines
Regulation (EU) 2024/886 made instant payments mandatory rather than optional. Euro-area banks had to be able to receive instant payments from 9 January 2025 and send them from 9 October 2025. From 9 January 2025, providers could not charge more for an instant transfer than for a standard one, and they must check their own clients against EU sanctions lists rather than screening each instant payment. Verification of payee became mandatory on 9 October 2025.
Euro-area e-money and payment institutions have a later date: they must offer sending and receiving by 9 April 2027.
A worked example
An illustrative case: a marketplace paying out €1.2m a day to 3,000 sellers by standard SCT has funds in transit for up to one business day, and a Friday batch arrives on Monday. Switching to SCT Inst lets each seller be paid within seconds of release, and the marketplace no longer needs to prefund a weekend buffer. Since standard and instant transfers must cost the same, the cost of the switch is operational, not per-payment.
SCT Inst and fintech valuations
For an EMI or PI being sold before April 2027, readiness for SCT Inst is a live due diligence item. Buyers should check whether the target has direct or indirect access to an instant clearing mechanism, whether its sanctions screening runs on the client-screening model the regulation requires, and whether its core ledger can post and reconcile payments 24/7. A target still running nightly batch processing faces a rebuild cost that belongs in the price.