Issue 2

Every bill or invoice that offers BPAY as a payment method includes a Biller Code and a Customer Reference Number (CRN).

The Biller Code refers to the business unit to which a person is making a payment. For instance a telecommunications company, a local council or a utility company would each have its own Biller Code, and this number remains constant from one bill to the next.

The CRN, however, identifies a particular customer and their BPAY payment made to an organisation. Depending on the business, the CRN can remain constant for each customer or change from bill to bill.

Generated by each business, the CRN relates to the customer?s account number or invoice number. To ensure that a CRN is entered correctly every time a BPAY payment is made, it is validated at the business? financial institution for its length and format, using a Check Digit ? a part of the CRN.

Additionally, a biller can create specific validation requirements within the CRN, if necessary. For example, when making a BPAY payment a biller may require the first six digits of the CRN to match the first six digits of the customer?s account number with the biller.

This means the process of checking payments can be fully automated, therefore, minimising mistaken payments.

The CRN is one of the reasons why the reconciliation of a BPAY payment is so simple.