For bank transfers, Easter is the longest weekend of the year: they will not be processed for four days, from Thursday March 28 at 6 p.m. to Tuesday April 2 at 2:30 a.m. This long break certainly did not nothing exceptional, it has taken place every year since 2002. But the 2024 calendar is special, the Easter weekend falls at the very end of the month, the salary payment period.
Those whose employer has not anticipated this coincidence of the calendar could see their salary arrive in their account later than usual, Tuesday April 2.
To understand, you need to know that the system used by European banks to transfer money between them in real time, “Target 2”, is not operational at night, on Saturdays, Sundays and six public holidays in the year (the same in all countries, even if these days are not public holidays everywhere): New Year’s Day, Good Friday, before Easter, Easter Monday, 1er May, Christmas and December 26. These closing ranges are “maintenance windows of a highly automated system”indicates Claudine Hurman, director of innovation and financial market infrastructures at the Banque de France.
The latter, like the French Banking Federation (FBF), however wants to be reassuring: Target’s schedule is known in advance, the scenario has already been encountered, and the banks are supposed to have relayed the information to employers, to encourage them to pay salaries in advance. “The Target calendar has been available to our business customers since March 20. And we alerted them with a banner on our portal on March 25”specifies, for example, BNP Paribas.
Civil servants paid on the 28th
“The Banque de France – state banker – has informed the General Directorate of Public Finances, which pays the salaries of civil servants, the latter will therefore be paid no later than Thursday March 28,” emphasizes for his part Mme Hurman.
The FBF reminds that instant transfers, executed in ten seconds twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week “remain operational during periods when settlement systems are closed”. This service, which is still often paid for, but which should become free in 2025, is therefore an option for companies that have forgotten to look at the calendar, and individuals who will need to transfer money this weekend.
Clarification from the Banque de France: internal transfers do not go through Target 2. Those who have the same bank as their employer, and if the latter makes their transfers on the 29th, can be credited the same day, Good Friday not being public holiday in France and in Alsace-Moselle. Be careful, however, many banks stop processing these transactions, even internal ones, on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays.
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