FedACH® Back Office Conversion Resource Center – BOC Overview

This resource provides an overview of the Back Office Conversion (BOC) standard entry class (SEC) code, including a process flow chart.

What is BOC and How Does it Work?

BOC is the SEC code that will enable businesses to accept eligible paper checks at the point-of-purchase or at a manned bill payment location and then convert those checks into ACH debits. Although the conversion of checks can take place in a merchant's "back office," this can also happen at the company's headquarters, a separate processing site, or by a third-party service provider. A merchant (Originator) notifies its customers at the point-of-purchase or manned bill payment location that their check payments may be processed using check conversion. The notification allows that by presenting a check payment, the consumer has authorized the conversion from paper to electronic. The consumer may opt out of check conversion, at which time the merchant may choose to offer an alternative payment option.

How Does BOC Work?

  1. A consumer makes a payment by check to a merchant.
  2. The checks are collected throughout the day and later sent to the back office. The check is used as a source document to retrieve the MICR information necessary to create an ACH transaction in lieu of processing the paper check. Information is taken from the magnetic ink character recognition (MICR) line at the bottom of the check (i.e., routing number of the payor bank, number of the check and account number of the consumer.) The amount of the check is captured using a variety of automated methods.
  3. The merchant subsequently compiles a file of multiple ACH transactions for delivery to its financial institution (ODFI) and ultimately for settlement.
  4. The ODFI transmits the file of BOC items to the Federal Reserve for processing.
  5. The Federal Reserve processes the file and passes a credit for the BOC items to the ODFI and debits to RDFIs.
  6. The consumer's financial institution (RDFI) debits the consumer's account. The payment is listed on his or her account statement, including the date of the payment, name of the company paid, check number, and amount of payment.
BOC Flow

Click here for more information on Point-of-Purchase(POP) and Accounts Receivable Conversion (ARC).

For more information about FedACH Services or BOC, visit the service offerings pages or contact your FedACH Sales Specialist.

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