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What Is a SWIFT MT103 Message Explained
A SWIFT MT103 is a single customer credit transfer message between banks. Learn what it does and how pacs.008 replaced it on Swift's FINplus service.
Key takeaways
MT103 is a single customer credit transfer message in SWIFT FIN format, and its message type is always 103.
Since 22 November 2025, pacs.008 has replaced MT103 on Swift's FINplus service.
MT103 and pacs.008 ran side by side from March 2023 until that date.
Corporate MT messages in the SCORE service continue for the foreseeable future.
A SWIFT MT103 is a message one bank sends to another to move money for a single customer. It carries the payment instruction between financial institutions. The format is now being retired: on Swift's main interbank service, its ISO 20022 successor, pacs.008, does the same job.
What is a SWIFT MT103 message?
A SWIFT MT103 is a single customer credit transfer message in SWIFT FIN format, according to Huntington's developer documentation. In the application header (block 2), the message type is always 103 for this message.
In plain terms, you ask your bank to send money abroad, and your bank sends an MT103 to the next bank in the chain. Each bank passes the instruction along until the beneficiary's bank receives it and credits the account.
The message moves instructions, not money. The funds settle separately between the banks involved, which is why the message and the actual money can arrive at different times.
Is MT103 still used after the ISO 20022 migration?
MT103 is no longer used for payment instructions on Swift's FINplus service. Since 22 November 2025, MT payment instructions such as MT103 have been replaced by their PACS equivalents, and the MT103 customer credit transfer maps to pacs.008.
The switch was gradual. According to ING's migration page, pacs.008 has been available on FINplus since March 2023, so both formats coexisted until the cutover date.
Some exceptions remain. Per the same source, MT messages exchanged in the Swift for Corporates (SCORE) service continue as they are for the foreseeable future. Other MT categories, such as 3xx and 5xx, are not affected. The CBPR+ scope covers messages between financial institutions only.
Swift also offers a temporary fallback conversion service. According to ING, it applies additional validation rules and converts MT messages that institutions keep sending into the appropriate PACS format.
What should you do if someone asks for an MT103?
Ask your bank what payment confirmation it issues today, because the MT103 format has been replaced for interbank instructions. Do not assume a bank will still produce an MT103-style document, since that practice varies by institution.
Ask your bank which confirmation document it provides for an outgoing international payment.
Tell the requester the payment moved under the ISO 20022 pacs.008 format if it was sent after 22 November 2025.
Share the transfer date, amount, and beneficiary details from your bank statement.
Check whether the payment ran through corporate SCORE channels, where MT messages continue.
Teams that track payments alongside prospects can keep these notes in a CRM. crmchat lets you add custom properties to leads in your Telegram pipeline, so you can store a payment status next to each deal. See the crmchat Help Center for setup.
If you vet payment partners in sales, the guide to vetting payment processors covers related checks. For large transfers, see the two-person approval process. If you check a counterparty before paying, read about public registry data.
crmchat includes a Telegram-native pipeline that keeps your leads, notes, and conversations in one place, so payment follow-ups do not live in scattered chats.
FAQ
What does MT103 stand for?
MT stands for message type, and 103 identifies the single customer credit transfer message. According to Huntington, the type in block 2 is always 103 for this message.
What replaced MT103?
The ISO 20022 message pacs.008 replaced it. Per ING, the MT103 customer credit transfer maps to pacs.008 on FINplus.
When did MT103 stop being used?
MT payment instructions were replaced on Swift's FINplus service on 22 November 2025. Before that, MT103 and pacs.008 coexisted from March 2023, according to ING.
Are all MT messages gone?
No. Other categories such as 3xx and 5xx are not impacted, and MT messages in the SCORE corporate service continue for the foreseeable future, per ING.
