CHAPS payments: cut-off times, fees and limits

What CHAPS is

CHAPS stands for the Clearing House Automated Payment System. Unlike BACS, which batches payments and nets them over a three-day cycle, CHAPS is a real-time gross settlement system: every payment is settled individually, in full, the moment it is processed, across accounts the banks hold directly at the Bank of England.

That design is what gives CHAPS its two defining properties. Settlement is same-day, and it is final — once a CHAPS payment has settled it cannot be reversed by the sender. Those two guarantees are what you are paying for, and they are the reason the system carries a small fraction of UK payment volume but the overwhelming majority of its value.

Cut-off times and timings

The CHAPS system is open 06:00 to 18:00, Monday to Friday, excluding bank holidays in England and Wales. Within that window there are two distinct deadlines, and confusing them is the most common cause of a missed same-day settlement:

The scheme deadline is not your deadline. Banks set their own, substantially earlier cut-offs so they have time to process, screen and submit. A bank may stop accepting same-day CHAPS instructions at lunchtime even though the system stays open until the evening. Always work from your bank's published tariff and cut-off table, not from the Bank of England's scheme times.

Once submitted and settled, funds are typically available to the beneficiary within a couple of hours, and often much faster. You can check any specific date against our payment timing calculator, which accounts for weekends and bank holidays.

Limits and finality

CHAPS has no scheme-level upper limit. This is the single biggest functional difference from Faster Payments, which is capped at £1 million at scheme level and frequently much lower at individual banks. If you need to move £3 million in one instruction, CHAPS is the sterling route.

Your bank will still apply its own controls: per-payment limits by channel, dual authorisation thresholds, and sometimes a requirement to instruct larger payments in a branch or by telephone rather than online. Those are bank policies, not scheme rules.

Settlement finality matters just as much. A settled CHAPS payment is irrevocable. If you send money to the wrong account, your bank cannot simply pull it back — it can only ask the receiving bank to request the funds from the beneficiary, who has to agree. Validate the beneficiary details before you instruct: use Confirmation of Payee, and for international beneficiaries check the account format with our IBAN checker.

What CHAPS costs

CHAPS is the most expensive of the three domestic sterling rails per payment. Sending banks typically charge somewhere in the region of £20 to £35 per payment, though this varies materially by bank, account type and instruction channel — online is usually cheaper than branch or telephone — and some providers have removed the charge for certain accounts. Receiving a CHAPS payment is normally free.

The economics are straightforward: a flat fee of roughly £25 is negligible on a £500,000 completion and absurd on a £400 invoice. The fee is the price of same-day certainty at unlimited value. Where you do not need both, a cheaper rail will do the job — and if the payment is going abroad, the fee is usually the smaller part of the cost anyway, with the FX margin dominating.

When to use CHAPS

CHAPS earns its fee in a fairly narrow set of situations:

• Property completions. Conveyancers use CHAPS almost universally, because completion requires irrevocable, same-day settlement of a sum that usually exceeds Faster Payments limits.
• High-value supplier settlements. Where the amount exceeds your Faster Payments limit, or where the supplier requires confirmed same-day receipt before releasing goods.
• Treasury movements. Moving large balances between your own accounts at different institutions, particularly against a deadline.
• Time-critical payments where failure is expensive. Tax deadlines, court-ordered payments, or anything where late arrival triggers a penalty far larger than the fee.

Conversely, CHAPS is the wrong tool for routine payables, payroll, or anything scheduled in advance. Those are what BACS exists for, at a fraction of a penny per payment.

CHAPS vs Faster Payments vs BACS

In practice most businesses need all three, which is a large part of why multi-rail access from a single account is worth having rather than maintaining separate arrangements per scheme.

Getting a CHAPS payment right

1. Confirm your bank's cut-off, not the scheme's. Build in at least an hour of slack; screening delays are common on large values.
2. Verify the beneficiary before instructing. Finality means errors are hard to unwind. Use Confirmation of Payee for UK accounts.
3. Check the date is a working day on the right calendar. CHAPS follows England & Wales bank holidays; euro payments follow a different calendar entirely.
4. Expect screening on large or unusual payments. Sanctions and fraud checks can add hours. Notify your bank in advance of an unusually large payment.
5. Keep the settlement reference. It is the evidence that funds were sent, which matters in a completion chain.

Frequently asked questions

What is a CHAPS payment?

CHAPS is the UK's high-value payment system, operated by the Bank of England. It settles each payment individually and in real time across accounts held at the Bank of England, so funds move the same working day and the payment is irrevocable once settled. There is no upper limit on a CHAPS payment.

What time is the CHAPS cut-off?

The CHAPS system is open from 06:00 to 18:00 on working days. The deadline for customer payments is 17:40, while 18:00 applies to interbank payments. Individual banks set their own earlier cut-offs for their customers, often in the early or mid afternoon, so check your bank's published deadline rather than relying on the scheme time.

Is there a maximum CHAPS payment amount?

No. CHAPS has no scheme-level upper limit, which is the main reason it is used for property completions and large corporate settlements. Your own bank may apply limits based on your account, authorisation levels or channel, but the payment system itself does not cap the value.

How much does a CHAPS payment cost?

Sending banks typically charge in the region of £20 to £35 per CHAPS payment, though tariffs vary by bank, account type and channel, and some providers have removed the charge. Receiving a CHAPS payment is normally free. Check your bank's current published tariff, as these fees change.

Does CHAPS work at weekends?

No. CHAPS operates on working days only, Monday to Friday, excluding bank holidays in England and Wales. A payment instructed on a Saturday will settle on the next working day. If you need to move money outside those hours, Faster Payments runs 24 hours a day but is subject to value limits.

Can a CHAPS payment be recalled?

Not unilaterally. CHAPS payments settle with finality, so once settled the transfer is irrevocable. If you send funds in error, your bank can only request the return of the money from the receiving bank, which depends on the beneficiary's cooperation. That finality is precisely why CHAPS is used where certainty matters.

Related guides and tools

Work out arrival dates with the payment timing calculator. For the other UK rails, see our BACS guide; for euro and international payments, the SEPA guide and SWIFT guide. Comparing providers on payment capability? See our UK business banking comparison.

Written by the financeb2b editorial team · Scheme facts sourced from the Bank of England · Last updated 29 August 2026 · Editorial policy