Money in the recipient’s account in seconds, at 2am on a Sunday, over whichever instant rail actually reaches them. A $50,000 payout costs ten dollars and settles before the API call returns.
An instant payout delivers funds to a recipient's bank account or debit card in seconds, at any hour, including weekends and bank holidays. It runs over real-time rails — RTP, FedNow, or push-to-card — rather than the batched ACH network, and settlement is confirmed immediately and irrevocably instead of hours or days later.
No single instant rail reaches every US account, which is why 'instant payouts' from a single-rail provider quietly become next-day for a slice of your recipients.
The bank-to-bank instant rail, live at institutions covering the large majority of US demand deposit accounts. Credit-push only, irrevocable on settlement, with a confirmation of receipt returned in the response.
The Federal Reserve's instant rail. Complementary reach to RTP — many smaller institutions joined FedNow first — so the two together cover materially more accounts than either alone.
Pushes funds to an eligible Visa or Mastercard debit card instead of an account number. The fallback that reaches a recipient who has a debit card but whose bank is on neither instant rail.
A percentage fee on payouts is punishing at size — which is exactly where payouts get big. Capping at ten dollars means the fee stops mattering long before your transfers do.
Cheaper than same-day ACH at $1.50.
More than same-day ACH — you are buying nights and weekends.
The cap binds. 0.2% effective.
Still $10. 0.02% effective.
A seller or driver who can cash out at 9pm Saturday churns less than one who waits until Tuesday. This is the single most common reason platforms adopt an instant rail.
The moment a claim is approved is the moment the money matters. Waiting for a batch window is a customer-experience problem long before it is a treasury one.
ACH does not settle on weekends or Federal Reserve holidays. If the payment has to land Sunday, instant is not the fast option — it is the only option.
Above roughly $1,050 the $10 cap makes instant cheaper than a $30 wire, with settlement in seconds instead of the same afternoon.
Recipients you cannot reach, and sends you cannot take back. Both are handled before the transfer leaves, because neither can be handled after.
Not every account can receive on an instant rail. We resolve the receiving institution's capability first, so you learn a recipient is unreachable before the payout is promised rather than after it fails.
You choose the fallback: attempt RTP, then FedNow, then push-to-card, then same-day ACH — or refuse to downgrade at all and surface the failure. The chain is a policy, not a hidden default.
The settlement webhook carries the rail that actually delivered, so your ledger records what happened rather than what was requested. Same correlation_id across every attempt.
RTP and FedNow credits cannot be recalled. That is the point, and it is also the risk: fund verification and spend caps have to happen before the send, which is why payouts release from a custody wallet rather than firing straight from your balance.
0.95% of the transfer, capped at $10.00, across RTP, FedNow, and push-to-card. The cap binds above roughly $1,050, so a $5,000 instant payout and a $50,000 instant payout both cost $10.00.
Seconds. RTP and FedNow settle in real time, 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, including weekends and Federal Reserve holidays. Push-to-card typically lands in seconds to minutes depending on the issuing bank. Settlement is confirmed in the API response, not hours later by a batch file.
RTP is operated by The Clearing House, a private bank consortium, and launched in 2017. FedNow is operated by the Federal Reserve and launched in 2023. They are functionally similar instant credit-push rails, but their participating-institution lists differ — many smaller banks and credit unions joined FedNow first — so supporting both meaningfully increases the share of recipients you can reach instantly.
No. RTP and FedNow credits are irrevocable once settled; there is no return mechanism equivalent to an ACH return. This is why Paystack releases instant payouts from a custody wallet after your caps, blocklists, and approval rules have been applied — the control has to sit before the send, because there is no after.
They cross over around $158. Below that, 0.95% is less than the $1.50 same-day ACH flat fee; above it, same-day ACH is cheaper until the $10.00 cap takes over near $1,050. But price is usually the wrong axis: same-day ACH cannot settle on a weekend at any price.
Paystack resolves the receiving institution's reachability before committing, then applies the fallback chain you configure — FedNow, then push-to-card, then same-day ACH — or fails loudly if you would rather not downgrade silently. The settlement event always reports the rail that actually delivered.
The instant rails carry network and institution-level transaction limits that vary by participant, and Paystack applies your own per-workspace and per-agent caps on top. Very large disbursements often route to standard ACH or wire, both of which are supported from the same API.
Count and average size is enough to show you the blended cost against your current provider, and how much of your volume the $10 cap absorbs.