Real time, real possibilities: 60 per cent of Canadian businesses ready to adopt real-time payments
Author
Jon Purther
Director, Research, Payments Canada
Jon’s career encompasses more than 25 years of senior management experience in forensic research and strategic marketing management, including domestic and international assignments. With Payments Canada, Jon is spearheading a team involved in both strategic foresight and product/market research.
Key takeaways:
- Canada’s Real-Time Rail (RTR), a new piece of critical national payment infrastructure, is scheduled to launch in Q4 2026, following a comprehensive testing period, which will enable system participants to offer new, efficient payment options to businesses.
- 60 per cent of Canadian businesses are ready to adopt real-time payments to overcome everyday payment bottlenecks, such as cash flow forecasting issues and costly payment delays.
- Businesses have clear, practical scenarios in mind for sending real-time payments, including tax payments to the government, domestic account-to-account transfers and payments to suppliers.
A Halifax manufacturer misses a lucrative two per cent supplier discount by six hours – not because they couldn’t pay, but because their payment was stuck in limbo. Meanwhile, across the country, a Vancouver business owner stares at her spreadsheet, unable to forecast cash flow because customer payments take days to clear.
For many businesses, payment delays aren’t just an inconvenience; they cost money, damage relationships and drain valuable time and resources. Real-time payments will soon help address these everyday payment bottlenecks.
Launching in Q4 2026, Canada’s Real-Time Rail is laying the foundation for businesses to take advantage of safe and secure transactions that settle and clear instantly (even on weekends and holidays), reducing time spent on manual reconciliation so owners can spend more time on what matters most.
Canadian businesses are ready for real-time
Recent Payments Canada research shows that business owners demonstrate strong intent to integrate real-time payments into their operations, with three in five businesses surveyed saying they would use real-time payments to send or receive money in given situations.
Almost a third of businesses (29 per cent) surveyed say guaranteed payments is the real-time payments feature that matters most to them for sending or receiving payments. This could save them both time and money, eliminating late fees and taking the guesswork out of cash flow forecasting. This was followed by real-time fraud monitoring (27 per cent), underscoring the value businesses place on leveraging a payment system with embedded features that can help combat fraud and financial crimes.
When asked which payment feature would deliver the most benefit for sending or receiving a payment, businesses painted a clear picture of their needs. Forty per cent wanted recurring payments – which could lessen the administrative burden on back-office teams already stretched thin. Another 36 per cent prioritized aliases or easy account identification, minimizing costly transfer mistakes, while 35 per cent emphasized that a confirmation of payee feature would be beneficial to make sure that the money they are sending is going to exactly who it is supposed to.
Sending payments faster, with greater confidence
Moving money quickly matters, especially when it can be costly to be late. Canadian businesses surveyed would use real-time payments to make sure that money they are sending gets to where it needs to go without any delay. This includes:
- Sending a tax payment to the government (16 per cent) – avoiding costly interest and late penalties
- Domestic account-to-account transfers (16 per cent) – easily moving money between bank accounts in Canada
- Sending payments to suppliers (16 per cent) – making sure all payment deadlines are met
Commercial businesses (companies with annual revenue over $10 million) are also ready to embrace real-time payments when paying their employees. Twenty-one per cent report interest in using real-time payments for on-demand pay or earned wage access, helping to attract and retain talent in a competitive market.
A faster way to receive and reconcile payments
But it is not just about paying faster. Receiving payments in real time addresses an equally pressing need that has quietly cost Canadian businesses countless hours and dollars. When customer payments and domestic transfers arrive instantly, with enhanced data, same-day invoice matching becomes possible, which eliminates uncertainties.
Businesses surveyed cited domestic account-to-account transfers (19 per cent) and receiving bill payments from customers (17 per cent) as the top use cases for using real-time payments for receiving funds. Four in 10 also said that being able to request payment would be a beneficial feature of real-time payments, allowing them to take collections into their own hands.
Supporting demand and realizing the economic impact of the Real-Time Rail (RTR)
Real-time payments are poised to drive significant economic benefits for Canada by accelerating the circulation of dollars in the economy.
Scheduled for launch in Q4 2026, Canada’s RTR will enable competition, innovation, economic growth and financial inclusion. With it, Canadian businesses will be able to safely send and receive instant data-rich payments any time of day or night, 365 days a year. Notably, the RTR will be one of the first real-time payment systems globally to launch with centralized fraud services from day one to complement participants' internal fraud controls.
Offering a new level of convenience, this new system will move money securely and instantly. It will give small and medium-sized businesses real-time access to funds, speed up loan payouts and help businesses pay their suppliers without delay. System participants will be able to offer new payment options that help Canadian businesses thrive and operate more efficiently, and these benefits will continue to grow over time as additional features are introduced.
Learn more about the benefits, testing and launch timeline for Canada's Real-Time Rail: Real Time, Real Possibilities.
About the study
The data is from Payments Canada’s Payment Behaviour Tracker Study, conducted between March 23 and April 3, 2026. Five hundred and seven Canadian businesses (401 small- and medium-sized enterprises and 106 commercial) were interviewed using Leger’s online panel, with a margin of error +/-2.5 per cent, 19 times out of 20.
