UAE Fund Transfer System (UAEFTS)

The UAEFTS is the Real Time Gross Settlement (RTGS) system of the United Arab Emirates, owned, hosted and managed by the Central Bank of the UAE.

The system has been operational since 2001. Starting with version 3, launched in 2012, the system has been enhanced periodically after consultation with the system's Consultative Working Group comprising an identified set of the participating institutes.

The system facilitates fund transfers between banks and other financial institutions in the UAE via their accounts held with the Central Bank. The system’s efficiency and governance are ensured by compliance with domestic and international standards, as well as the regulations detailed by CBUAE in the system’s Rules document.

Requests submitted by Participants are queued for immediate action by the system. Processing and settlement of transfer instructions take place continuously, in real time as per the governing rules.  Transfers are settled individually, without netting debits against credits. 

Authorised users of the requesting Participant can review the status of their requests throughout the system’s business hours.  Once a transfer request is processed, the system sends confirmation to all Participants affected by the transfer.

The UAEFTS provides full straight-through processing (STP) of payment requests by enabling processing of prescribed message formats using the Secure File Transfer Protocol (SFTP). Additionally, the UAEFTS allows messages to be keyed-in using a web-browser interface - named the UAEFTS Transactions and Enquiry Portal (TEP) – which can only be accessed by the Participants.