has risen by around 3¼ per cent per year. https : / / www. rba. gov. au / speeches / 2018 / sp - ag - 2018 - 08 - 23. html 3 / 7 23 / 08 / 2018 the reserve bank's government banking business | speeches | rba table : transactions and employment average annual growth since 2004 / 05 ( % ) rba's transactional banking volumes 3. 2 banking sector payment volumes 5. 3 real gdp 2. 8 rba banking staff 0. 1 banking and finance sector employment total employment source : rba, abs another factor is the bank's preparedness to contract and partner with third parties to provide specific payment services. in most instances, the bank has done this to take advantage of a vendor's broader customer base. in other words, we have tapped economies of scale where, because of our customers'relatively low transaction volumes, it would not have been cost effective for us to provide a service using only our own resources. in these instances, too, our customers have generally preferred to deal with the reserve bank as a single provider of a bundle of payment services sourced from different providers rather than deal separately with each provider. payment card acquiring services, for which costs are typically quite large, are an example of this. of course, a key factor, which, incidentally, has also underpinned our productivity, has been the application of payments technologies. to give just a few examples : online gateways have allowed the bank to offer a virtual shopfront for receiving payments to the government without the cost of a physical branch network ; increased network connectivity has meant that we can lodge the government's overseas pension payments directly into automated clearing houses in other countries rather than issue foreign currency cheques or money orders ; and greater processing capacity and system resilience means that we can now process certain government payments with a tolerance of no more than 20 minutes of system downtime per year. not surprisingly, we now invest more in technology. the share of information technology in the total cost of the bank's transactional banking business is now around 50 per cent compared with 25 per cent around 15 years ago. of course, developments in payments technology are ongoing. i would like to focus on three in particular because of their near - term potential for business banking customers : the new payments platform, known simply as npp ; open banking ; and digital identity, which is still on the drawing board. all have benefits for business banking customers

has certainly allowed the reserve bank to compete for the government's transactional banking business, delivering value for money services while, at the same time, allowing the bank to perform its traditional role of banker to the government. there will, of course, be more developments and further advances. the npp, open banking, and digital identity are just three examples of technology supporting the provision of services while being a potential source of competition and innovation. it is the bank's intention to continue providing its government banking customers with the services it needs, to make new products and services available where they offer a benefit to our business customers, and to do so in a way that is secure, reliable and provides value for money. endnotes [ * ] my thanks to stephanie connors ( rba ) and victoria richardson ( australian payments network ) for their contribution to this speech. the reserve bank's authority to provide banking services is set out in the. the act empowers the bank to act as banker to the commonwealth insofar as the commonwealth requires the bank to do so. the term ‘ agencies ’ refers to corporate and non - corporate commonwealth entities as defined under the the term is used here for ease of expression. however, only non - corporate commonwealth entities, which includes most government departments, are subject to the sweep arrangements. the review was commissioned by the treasurer in mid - 2017. the final report – which included 50 recommendations – was delivered to the government in early 2018. see australian treasury ( 2018 ), ‘ review into open banking in australia ’, final report, february. data sourced from australian payments network fraud statistics ( 2018 ),. available at < https : / / www. auspaynet. com. au / resources / fraud - statistics / july - 2016 - june - 2017 >. figures updated as at april 2018. reserve bank act governance performance and accountability act ( 2013 ). public payment fraud statistics jul 16 – jun 17 © reserve bank of australia, 2001 – 2018. all rights reserved. https : / / www. rba. gov. au / speeches / 2018 / sp - ag - 2018 - 08 - 23. html 7 / 7