It could possibly be done more than once a day, but what we're talking about is only the exchange of the payments between the financial institutions. As we set out in our submission, and as Mr. Legault pointed out, there are really four systems involved in a bill payment. The first part where the consumer speaks to his or her financial institution is not part of our system. Once they have that data they consolidate it in a batch system. Then they enter it and it goes across to the receiving financial institution.
When we're talking about the legs to the transaction, essentially we clear and settle once a day. If we were to clear and settle twice a day you may be able to shorten the overnight settlement, because settlement occurs overnight, but it doesn't mean that billers will actually receive the funds any quicker. You may shorten it by a few hours at best.
In many cases, once Canadian financial institutions receive the data they give provisional credit for many of the transactions before settlement is provided. So the merchant or the biller generally has the funds before settlement occurs.