Karsten Wenzlaff, Advisor
August 26th, 2025
Karsten Wenzlaff is a Crowdfunding and Fintech Expert from Germany. He is Secretary-General of Digit[...]
Flywire And Trustly Launch Pay By Bank In Canada
August 12, 2026 | NCFA Market Activity | Open Banking Open Finance And Data Sharing, Payments Infrastructure And Money Movement, Cross Border Payments And FX
Bank Authentication Modernizes A Familiar Canadian Payment Rail
On August 12, 2026, Boston-headquartered U.S. payments company Flywire expanded its partnership with Stockholm-headquartered Swedish Pay by Bank provider Trustly to offer Pay by Bank payments in Canada and the United States.
The Canadian launch is notable because two foreign payment companies are commercializing a Pay by Bank experience here before Canada has a fully operational regulated consumer-driven banking system with payment initiation. Flywire and Trustly are improving how an existing bank payment is authenticated and started rather than waiting for Canada's future open banking payment rails.
The Canadian Payment Still Runs On PAD
Flywire's Canadian payment instructions describe a simple flow. The payer selects Online Bank Transfer in CAD, a Trustly window opens, and the payer signs into their bank. Payment details are filled in automatically and the bank can request additional verification before the payment is authorized.
Flywire says the money is normally debited within 24 hours and delivered to the institution in about five business days. Only personal bank accounts are currently supported. Business and corporate accounts aren't.
The timing tells us the product isn't an instant payment and it isn't using Canada's Real Time Rail. Flywire's own developer documentation identifies its Canadian EFT authorization as a pre-authorized debit agreement (PAD).
Trustly adds the digital layer around that debit, using bank authentication and account data to make the payment easier to initiate inside Flywire.
Alex Gonthier, Founder and CEO, Trustly:
“Pay by Bank is a term that is too general. Generic essentially. What we really mean is Open Banking-based or -enabled payments over bank rails.”
That description fits the Canadian launch particularly well. The bank rail isn't new. The authentication, data and payment experience around it are what Trustly changes.
Large Payments Give Pay By Bank A Clear Use Case
Flywire specializes in payments where the amount, currency or accounts receivable process can be more complicated than an ordinary checkout. It currently supports more than 5,100 clients across education, healthcare, travel and B2B markets, with payments available in more than 140 currencies across 240 countries and territories.
Its platform processed US$11.4 billion in payment volume during the first quarter of 2026 alone.
Canadian payment options work differently. Flywire lets customers use Interac e-Transfer for payments up to C$3,000, and those payments can arrive quickly. Online bill payment can handle larger amounts, but the payer has to leave Flywire, find Flywire as a biller in online banking and complete the payment there.
Trustly keeps more of that process inside Flywire. The payer signs into their bank and approves the payment without having to set up a biller or copy payment details.
That can be useful for larger payments such as tuition. Flywire hasn't published one Canada-wide Trustly limit, so the amount a payer can send depends partly on the limits set by their bank.
Pay By Bank Is Arriving Before Canadian Open Banking Payments
The terminology needs care because Trustly calls the product an open banking payment while Canada's regulated consumer-driven banking framework is still being implemented.
The federal framework is designed to replace credential sharing with regulated API-based financial data access. Payment initiation, often called write access, belongs to a later phase. As of August 2026, the government is still working on the implementation rules for Canada’s consumer-driven banking framework.
Flywire's Canadian Trustly instructions, by contrast, currently ask the payer to sign into online banking through the Trustly experience. Public documentation doesn't establish that every participating Canadian financial institution is connected through a direct API.
It shows that commercial Pay by Bank services can develop before Canada's regulated framework reaches payment initiation.
The longer-term opportunity gets more interesting when the payment experience and settlement infrastructure improve together. Canada's financial infrastructure is opening to new participants, while the Real Time Rail is intended to bring instant, data-rich clearing and settlement. Flywire and Trustly are showing what fintechs can build above the infrastructure available today.
Talking Point
Flywire and Trustly aren't waiting for Canadian open banking payments to become fully operational. They're bringing an international Pay by Bank model into Canada by adding bank authentication and a cleaner payment experience to PAD infrastructure that already works. For Canadian fintechs, that shows an example of how much product innovation can happen above the payment rail before the rail itself changes.
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