To ACH money to someone, log into your bank’s online portal, open the transfer menu, and enter four things about the recipient: their full name as it appears on their account, the nine-digit routing number of their bank, their account number, and whether the account is checking or savings. Confirm the amount and date, submit, and the funds typically arrive in one to three business days at no charge from most consumer banks.
What You Need From the Recipient
Every ACH transfer requires the same four pieces of information:
- The recipient’s full name, spelled the way it appears on their bank account. A mismatch can cause the transfer to be rejected.
- The nine-digit routing number identifying their bank. It’s the first set of digits on the bottom-left of a paper check, or in the account details section of their mobile banking app.
- The account number for the specific account receiving the funds.
- The account type: checking or savings.
The routing number is the one people most often confuse with other numbers on a check. Get any of these wrong and you’re looking at delays at best, misdirected funds at worst. If the recipient doesn’t have a check handy, both numbers appear somewhere in their online banking account details.
Linking and Verifying the Account
The first time you add a new recipient, your bank will usually verify the account before letting you send full transfers. The standard method is micro-deposits: your bank sends two small deposits, each typically under $1, and you or the recipient confirms the exact amounts. Those test deposits usually take one to three business days to appear. Some banks now offer instant verification that connects directly to the recipient’s bank and skips this step, but micro-deposits remain the fallback.
Sending the Transfer
Once the account is linked and verified, the actual transfer takes a couple of minutes:
- Log into online banking and open the “Transfer” or “Move Money” menu. Choose which of your accounts the money should come from.
- Pick the recipient from your saved list.
- Enter the dollar amount and choose whether to send it today or schedule a future date.
- Review the summary screen carefully, especially the amount, and confirm.
Your bank will generate a confirmation number and usually email a receipt. Save both. If anything goes wrong later, the confirmation number is what your bank needs to trace the payment.
Recurring Transfers
Most banks let you schedule repeating ACH transfers, weekly, biweekly, or monthly, for things like rent or regular support to family. Setting one up authorizes your bank to send the specified amount on each scheduled date without asking you again. Federal rules require that authorization to be in writing or its electronic equivalent, and you have the right to stop any individual payment by notifying your bank at least three business days before the scheduled date. Keep a record of when you authorized the transfer and the terms, because disputes over recurring debits are one of the more common ACH problems.
How Long It Takes
A standard ACH transfer settles in one to three business days. The network processes transactions in batches at scheduled windows rather than one at a time, so a transfer you submit Tuesday afternoon joins a queue that clears at the next processing cycle. Weekends and federal holidays are dead time. Nothing moves until the next business day.1Federal Reserve Financial Services. FedACH Processing Schedule
A Friday afternoon transfer likely won’t start processing until Monday, and the recipient may not see the funds until Tuesday or Wednesday. A long weekend pushes that out further.
Same-Day ACH
Most banks now offer Same-Day ACH for faster delivery. The Federal Reserve processes same-day transactions in three windows, with submission cutoffs at 10:30 a.m., 2:45 p.m., and 4:45 p.m. ET.1Federal Reserve Financial Services. FedACH Processing Schedule Meet a cutoff and the funds settle the same day. The per-transaction limit for Same-Day ACH is $1 million.2Nacha. Increasing the Same Day ACH Dollar Limit
One caveat: same-day settlement means the funds reach the recipient’s bank the same day. Their bank may still place a hold before making the money available, particularly on larger amounts. When their bank releases the funds is a separate question from when they settle.
Limits and Fees
Your bank, not the ACH network, sets most of the limits you’ll actually encounter. Personal checking accounts at major banks commonly cap outgoing ACH transfers somewhere between $2,000 and $10,000 per day, though many banks will raise the cap temporarily after a phone call or branch visit. Business accounts run higher. These caps exist mainly for fraud control, so if you need to send more than your daily limit allows, call your bank.
Standard (non-same-day) ACH has no network-level dollar cap, though your bank’s limits still apply. Same-Day ACH tops out at $1 million per transaction under Nacha’s rules.2Nacha. Increasing the Same Day ACH Dollar Limit
Standard ACH transfers are free at most consumer banks. Same-day processing often carries a fee of roughly $1 to $10, depending on the institution. Banks must disclose the fees tied to your account under federal law, so check your fee schedule if you’re unsure.3Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 12 USC Ch. 44 – Truth in Savings
If You Send It to the Wrong Account
Sending an ACH payment to the wrong account is the scenario worth understanding before it happens, because recovery is harder than most people expect. ACH doesn’t have a chargeback button.
Nacha’s rules allow reversals only in narrow situations: a duplicate payment, a transfer to the wrong recipient, or a wrong dollar amount. The reversal request must reach the recipient’s bank within five banking days after the original transaction settled.4Nacha. ACH Network Rules – Reversals and Enforcement The clock runs from the settlement date, not the day you notice. Call your bank the moment you spot an error.
A reversal is a request, not a command. If the money landed in a valid account belonging to someone else, that person’s bank may decline to return the funds without the account holder’s cooperation, and if the account has been emptied, you may need to pursue the money through other channels.
Common Return Codes
When an ACH transfer fails, the recipient’s bank sends back a standardized code explaining why. The most frequent are insufficient funds in your account, a closed destination account, and an invalid account number. An “insufficient funds” return means you need to check your balance and resend. An “invalid account number” or “no account” return means you entered the wrong information; verify the details with the recipient before trying again.
If Someone Debits Your Account Without Permission
Federal law caps your losses on unauthorized ACH transfers, but the cap depends entirely on how quickly you report. Under the Electronic Fund Transfer Act:5Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 15 USC 1693g – Consumer Liability
- Report within 2 business days of learning about it and your liability caps at $50.
- Report between 2 and 60 days and your liability can rise to $500 for transfers that occurred after the two-day window.
- Report after 60 days and you can be on the hook for the full amount of any unauthorized transfers that happened after the 60-day deadline, with no cap.
The 60-day clock starts when your bank sends the periodic statement showing the unauthorized transaction. Miss it and you can lose the right to dispute those charges entirely.6Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Regulation E Section 1005.11 – Procedures for Resolving Errors This is where most people get hurt: an unauthorized debit slips by unnoticed for months, and by the time it’s caught, the protection window has closed. Read your statements.
Once you report, your bank has 10 business days to investigate. It can extend the investigation to 45 days, but only if it provisionally credits the disputed amount to your account within those first 10 business days.6Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Regulation E Section 1005.11 – Procedures for Resolving Errors For accounts opened within the last 30 days, those windows stretch to 20 business days and 90 days.
Sending Large Amounts
ACH transfers don’t trigger taxes on their own. What matters is why the money moved.
If you send more than $19,000 to any single person during 2026, you may need to file a gift tax return (Form 709) for the amount above that threshold.7Internal Revenue Service. Gifts and Inheritances Filing usually doesn’t mean owing. The lifetime gift tax exemption is large enough that most people never actually pay gift tax. But the return is expected once you cross $19,000. Married couples can each give $19,000 to the same person, so the threshold effectively doubles to $38,000 before a return is required.
One thing to avoid: don’t break a large transfer into smaller pieces to stay under any reporting threshold. Banks are required to flag that pattern, and structuring transactions to evade reporting is a federal crime in itself, even when the underlying money is legitimate. Money laundering charges carry up to 20 years in federal prison and fines up to $500,000 or twice the value of the transaction.8Office of the Law Revision Counsel. 18 USC 1956 – Laundering of Monetary Instruments Willful Bank Secrecy Act violations tied to a pattern of criminal activity can bring up to 10 years.9FFIEC. BSA/AML Examination Manual – Introduction Send the full amount in one transfer if that’s what you owe.