With the deadline for one of the most critical transitions in the global financial ecosystem – the mandatory shift to ISO 20022 messaging standards – set for November 2025, banks worldwide are under increasing pressure to modernize their payment infrastructures, according to a recent white paper.

Institutions that fail to comply risk being disconnected from key clearing networks, facing operational downtime and incurring regulatory sanctions, finds the ISO 20022 Migration 101: Steps and Strategies for Banks white paper, published by payment solutions firm BPC, which explores the challenges banks face in complying with ISO 20022 standards, including legacy system limitations, operational risks, coordination complexities and resource constraints.

The white paper analyzes migration success stories, including:

• EthSwitch ( Ethiopia ): Transformation of the national payment switch to a real-time, ISO-20022-native instant payment system, enhancing financial inclusion and transaction speed nationwide.
• Meezan Bank ( Pakistan ): Deployment of a modern participant payment gateway integrated with national instant systems ( 1LINK and RAAST ), boosting transaction volumes, real-time transfers and open banking capabilities. The shift to ISO 20022 messaging, the paper notes, allowed Meezan to bridge the gap between multiple participants, ranging from banks and merchants to government agencies, by ensuring richer data exchange, improved interoperability and more seamless transaction processing.
• National Payments Switch ( Sierra Leone ): Establishment of an interconnection between six major commercial banks, microfinance institutions, mobile money operators and fintech companies to create a single ecosystem, aiming to enhance financial inclusion and encourage digital payments.

Importantly, the report highlights and explains the uneven capabilities among solution vendors, emphasizing the need for future-ready, agile platforms.

BPC’s SmartVista platform, the company points out, is designed to bridge the compliance gap and unlock the broader value of ISO 20022. By offering full native support for both legacy SWIFT MT and modern MX messaging, SmartVista, the report details, enables gradual migration with minimal to zero disruption. Its modular, microservices-based architecture ensures scalability, real-time processing and compliance with evolving global mandates, including SWIFT CBPR+ standards.

 “The successful renewal of our SWIFT CBPR+ attestation reinforces BPC’s position as a trusted partner for ISO 20022 migration,” says Evgeny Kozhin, BPC’s head of point of care. “With SmartVista, we enable banks not only to meet regulatory deadlines, but also unlock the full potential of richer data, greater interoperability and real-time payment capabilities.”