October 14, 2008

Following a review of the industry-wide image-based clearing project, formally known as Truncation and Electronic Cheque Presentment (TECP), the Canadian Payments Association’s (CPA) Board of Directors has decided to discontinue all further work on this initiative.
This decision was reached after an analysis of the findings of the project review. The review, conducted across all industry participants, highlighted the complexity of moving forward to industry-wide implementation.
The industry-wide TECP project was launched in 2003 with the intention of further improving the efficiency of Canada’s cheque clearing process and facilitating the introduction of a variety of image based services to businesses and consumers that would streamline their handling, storage and retrieval of cheques. A number of challenges arose as work progressed on this project resulting in implementation delays and the realization by some CPA participants that the back-office benefits they anticipated may no longer be achievable. Further, some felt that the high level of resources that would be required to move toward implementation could limit the ability of the CPA and the industry to address other priorities over the next three to four years.
The CPA decision only affects the plan for image exchange between financial institutions, i.e. “back-office” clearing and settlement functions. Customers will continue to benefit from image-based services, which most financial institutions are now offering, or planning to offer in the foreseeable future, by taking advantage of the technological foundation for leveraging cheque images that now exists
More information is available at the Canadian Payments Association website here.