Message Format Validation Rules (MFVR)

The MFVR support for the SWIFT OTD Library is a set of functions collectively known as the message format validation rules methods. These functions accurately test the semantic validity of a given subset of the SWIFT messages. Validation is performed according to standards provided in SWIFT’s publication, the Message Format Validation Rules Guide (current version).

There is one validation method for each MFVR message type and its corresponding OTD. Each method is called on a particular OTD and is used to validate the data of a given instance of that message type. Because business practices vary greatly between organizations, these functions can be modified as needed.

For examples of how the MFVR validation process works, you can import the sample validation Projects. For details, see SWIFT Projects.

SWIFT’s MFVR validation rules are known as semantic verification rules (SVRs) or semantic rules, as opposed to the syntactic rules, which verify the syntax of the fields only. Syntactic verification is built into each OTD.

SWIFT defines a total of 299 SVRs that are validated by the FIN network engine. SWIFT Alliance Access or IBM’s Merva products do not implement these rules, mainly because there is no functional model, and the implementation work is mostly manual. Each message type has to be validated against a subset of these rules.

In addition this set of 299 SVRs, SWIFT has defined a new series of rules to help enable straight-through processing (STP) in the securities industry. The OTD methods that validate for MFVR compliance also validate for compliance with STP rules.