Payments Canada undergoes leadership change amid slow shift to faster payments

Trains aren’t the only place Canada lags on high-speed rail, as the effort to bring in a faster payment system, known as the Real-Time Rail, is years behind schedule.

As an example, if you paid a bill online on the Thursday evening before the Easter long weekend, the payment might not be processed until Monday. 

A modernized system would mean payments go through near-instantly, 24 hours a day, bringing along billions of dollars of benefits, according to an estimate from the C.D. Howe Institute.

Getting the new system up and running will be the highest-profile task of the next CEO of Payments Canada as Tracey Black, who has run the organization since 2018, officially stepped down at the end of her term Monday.