International Bank Account Number - Adoption

Adoption

International bank transactions use either an IBAN or the current ISO 9362 Bank Identifier Code system (BIC or SWIFT code) in conjunction with the BBAN.

The banks of most countries in Europe publish account numbers using both the IBAN format as well as the nationally recognised identifiers – this being mandatory within the European Economic Area. In addition, the banks in many other countries including most states of the Middle East, North Africa and the Caribbean have implemented the IBAN format for account identification.

Banks in the British dependencies (except Gibraltar and the Crown Dependencies) do not use the IBAN, presumably due to internal banking regulatory issues. Banks in the Dutch West Indies also do not use the IBAN. Some banks outside Europe may not recognize IBAN, though this is expected to diminish with time. Non-European banks usually accept IBANs for accounts in Europe, although they might not treat IBANs differently from other foreign bank account numbers. In particular, they might not check the IBAN's validity prior to sending the transfer.

Banks in the United States do not use IBAN as account numbers for US accounts. Any adoption of the IBAN standard by US banks would likely be initiated by ANSI ASC X9, the US financial services standards development organization, but to date it has not done so. However a Working Group (WBAB20) was established as an X9 subcommittee to generate an IBAN construction for US Bank accounts.

Canadian financial institutions have not adopted IBAN and use bank transit numbers issued by the Canadian Payments Association for domestic transfers, and SWIFT for international transfers. There is no formal governmental or private sector regulatory requirement in Canada for the major banks to use IBAN.

Financial institutions in Australia and New Zealand do not use IBAN. They use Bank State Branch codes for domestic transfers and SWIFT for international transfers.