What is an ACH Return R06 – Return per ODFI?

Understanding what an ‘R06 – Return per ODFI’ ACH Return Reason Code Is, and How to Handle Them When Received:

As an ACH Originator, meaning anyone that sends ACH transactions to their ODFI, (Originating Depository Financial Institution), you will sometime come across an ACH Return of ‘R06 – Returned per ODFI’. So what exactly does this mean? What is an ODFI, and why was the ACH transaction Returned Unpaid?

What Is an ODFI?

First off, an ODFI is a bank that originates your ACH transactions to the Federal Reserve. This could be your actual bank or a Third Party Processor, (using their bank), that provides the mechanism for you to create, edit and submit ACH Transactions, (both Debit and Credit), to the Federal Reserve. Some banks/third-party processors will have an online interface for creating new ACH transactions and/or provide some sort of upload functionally via online or a Secure FTP site.

In either case, any bank that is sending the ACH transaction(s), (whether it is a ‘Debit From’ or a ‘Credit To’ transaction), to the Federal Reserve on your behalf, (you are called the Originator), is considered the ‘Originating Depository Financial Institution’, aka, ODFI.