XXX on BIC/SWIFT codes

[brendan]

Maybe the following will help some of you.

I entered a guest´s BIC/SWIFT code (for a Norwegian bank) and it was n´t accepted. I checked back with the guest and re-entered the code....no joy. Gave up and rang my bank and after the usual round of people who couldn´t help me I got a suggestion from one of them that I take off the final three Xs as she she seemed to remember this happening to someone else before.

I tried it and it worked. Apparently some banks have three Xs on the end of their BIC/SWIFT........God knows why!!

[falbayview]

i had similar problem from italian guest, got this from wiki:

The latest edition is ISO 9362:2009 (dated 2009-10-01). The SWIFT code is 8 or 11 characters, made up of:

4 letters: Institution Code or bank code.
2 letters: ISO 3166-1 alpha-2 country code
2 letters or digits: location code
if the second character is "0", then it is typically a test BIC as opposed to a BIC used on the live network.
if the second character is "1", then it denotes a passive participant in the SWIFT network
if the second character is "2", then it typically indicates a reverse billing BIC, where the recipient pays for the message
as opposed to the more usual mode whereby the sender pays for the message.
3 letters or digits: branch code, optional ('XXX' for primary office)

Where an 8-digit code is given, it may be assumed that it refers to the primary office.

he put 'XXX' as final three characters and it worked, seems to be different requirement depending where they're doing the transfer.

[memes]

I have an Italian bank account and the iban code ends in xxx - thanks for the handy tip to let people know to drop it if necc.
M

[falbayview]

yes, it seems some countries need it whilst others don't... nowt like confusing the issue, they call it progress

[kevsboredagain]

The XXX is optional and it simply depends on the software used to handle such codes. Each bank will likely have it's own software or use some off the shelf solution. Sometimes you can use 5 digits and sometimes you must add XXX.
The bank I write software for doesn't even need a BIC number but will ask you to verify it when making the transaction. The BIC can be determined in most cases from the IBAN.