About the FRPS
The Federal Reserve Payments Study (FRPS) is an ongoing effort to quantify aggregate payment volumes, payments fraud, and related information in the United States, offering a periodic benchmark of developments in the U.S. payments system to policymakers, the industry, and the public. The aggregates include payments from all types of U.S. domiciled accounts, including consumer and non-consumer accounts. The FRPS has based these aggregates on nationally representative data collected for 2000 and for every third year since. The FRPS has also conducted smaller and more targeted annual supplementary data collections for 2016 and subsequent years.
FRPS survey components include the following:
- The Depository and Financial Institutions Payments Survey (DFIPS) collects the number and value of major noncash payment types, cash withdrawals and deposits, payments fraud, and related information from commercial banks, savings institutions, and credit unions. A consistent set of large depository institutions is surveyed in years between triennial surveys, allowing annual estimates of changes in payment volumes among this key group of institutions. In triennial years, a representative sample of smaller institutions is also surveyed, allowing triennial estimates of national payment volumes and changes over three-year periods.
- The Networks, Processors, and Issuers Payments Surveys (NPIPS) are tailored to specific payment types and processors. The surveys collect the number and value of major noncash payment types, cash withdrawals, payments fraud, and related information. The surveys include a census of major general-purpose card networks, private-label card issuers and processors, automated clearinghouse (ACH) operators, and processors involved with other types of emerging and alternative payment methods and systems. Some surveys—such as general-purpose and private-label card surveys—allow annual estimates of national payment volumes and changes, while other surveys allow estimates on a triennial basis.