Hypothekarbank Lenzburg (HBL), Luzerner Kantonalbank (LUKB) and Zuger Kantonalbank (ZugerKB) have become the first Swiss financial institutions to offer eBill Direct Debit to their clients.
eBill Direct Debit integrates seamlessly into the established and widely used eBill platform.
SIX introduced the new eBill Direct Debit digital direct debit procedure in June 2025.
Half of Swiss households already use eBill. This allows for the seamless digital receipt and payment of invoices. SIX has now expanded the tried-and-tested infrastructure with the direct debit function, taking over existing interfaces and mechanisms.
For eBill portal banks, introducing eBill Direct Debit is a straightforward process, as the examples of HBL, LUKB and ZugerKB show. Thanks to close cooperation between SIX, financial institutions and core banking software providers, it has been possible for the solution to be developed, integrated within financial institutions and productively implemented within a short space of time.
The core banking software providers Finnova and Finstar have already integrated eBill Direct Debit into their platforms. The LUKB systems are based on Avaloq software and also support eBill Direct Debit.
Financial institutions benefit directly from these advanced core banking solutions, as the functionality is available within the software and ready to use on a technical level. This allows financial institutions to focus (primarily) on their own processes when rolling out eBill Direct Debit – for example, on communication with clients, contracts or internal processes.
Various eBill network partners, such as Abacus Research AG, Baumer, Billte, iomarket, SPSGlobal and Swisscom, have successfully integrated the new functionality into their systems or are currently working on its implementation. This means that invoice issuers now have access to eBill Direct Debit – accessing the eBill infrastructure through a standardized interface, enabling straightforward connection by invoice issuers.
eBill Direct Debit supports all functionalities of typical account-based direct debit solutions and offers a digital login process for the payer – in the secure environment of online banking.
With eBill Direct Debit, payment requests from invoice issuers are submitted and processed, and payments are automatically collected from the payer – all via eBill. Transactions are based on a digital direct debit and collection authorization previously set up in eBill. Payments are therefore processed directly from account to account and can be supplemented with additional information (e.g. invoice document).
eBill Direct Debit can be used for both large amounts as well as business-to-business receivables. Additionally, eBill Direct Debit offers invoice recipients increased security thanks to the integrated recall option with guaranteed repayment.
While eBill has fully digitized invoice processing and payment, eBill Direct Debit is now modernizing the outdated direct debit mechanism. For business clients, it is still possible to carry out targeted liquidity management using eBill Direct Debit and to perform bundled cash collection at a clearly defined point in time. For payers, eBill Direct Debit has the advantage of enabling them to object to the debit up to 60 days after collection has taken place.
Analog clients are also taken into account. From the summer of 2027, SIX will offer an extension of eBill Direct Debit for analog invoice recipients, allowing financial institutions to register their clients on their behalf and sign them up with invoice issuers – provided that the bank concerned is also actively offering this option.
