Bank transfers

The key features of the SEPA bank transfer
The SEPA bank transfer is a base payment system in euro - of any amount - to transfer non urgent sums of money within a maximum timeframe of three working days from the bank acceptance date. Of these three days, two are required to transfer the money from the payer bank to the payee bank and one day for the amount to be credited to the beneficiary's bank account.

Deutsche Bank has decided to reduce the time required to transfer the amount to the payee bank to one day and to carry out immediate transfers between Deutsche Bank customers in the SEPA area.


The main change in relation to bank transfers is the IBAN code (International Bank Account Number), which uniquely identifies every bank account. Starting from 1 January 2008, the IBAN code is must for every payment and will replace the previous bank details, represented at national level by the CIN, ABI and CAB codes and the account number. From 1 June 2008, if customers instructing a bank transfer do not provide the IBAN code, they are liable to a penalty fee.

What is IBAN

The IBAN is the international bank code consisting of a series of letters and digits that uniquely identify an account opened at any bank. The IBAN code varies in length, depending on the country, but can have a maximum of 34 characters.

The Italian IBAN code

For accounts opened with Italian banks, the IBAN has a fixed length of 27 characters and consists of the following elements:

  • the country code, IT;
  • 2 digits indicating the control code of the entire IBAN;
  • 1 letter corresponding to the CIN code;
  • 5 digits corresponding to the bank's ABI code;
  • 5 digits corresponding to the CAB code of the bank branch;
  • 12 alphanumeric characters corresponding to the account number.


The BIC (Bank Identifier Code) is the unique code that identifies the bank. It is used to identify banks internationally, with the purpose of making automated electronic messaging in the financial world easier.

Together with the IBAN, it provides a complete identification for the automatic commencement of the bank transfer.

How to get the IBAN

The IBAN code can be found on your bank statement and online on the pages of "db Interactive". It is recommended that customers ask payees for the IBAN code of the account into which the money is to be transferred.
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Last Update: June 29, 2010
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