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In 2016 the foundations were laid for pan-European innovative payment solutions. In the scheme layer, the European Payments Council (EPC) finalised the framework for pan-European instant payment solutions. The instant payment scheme is the basis for the Europe-wide implementation of instant credit transfers, as well as the launch pad for other innovative payment solutions, such as person-to-person mobile payments. Fostered by the Euro Retail Payments Board (ERPB), work is under way not only on instant payments and mobile payments, but also payment initiation services and e-invoicing, among other things.
In the clearing layer, (some) automated clearing houses (ACHs) agreed and committed to a pan-European approach for clearing instant payments in euro. This approach consists of
In the settlement layer, the Eurosystem launched an investigation into providing a pan-European instant payment settlement service in central bank money.
With these foundations in place, 2017 will see decisive action in all three layers. First, payment service providers will have to deliver instant payment solutions to the end users. Second, most ACHs will be ready to launch their instant payment clearing systems. And last but not least, the Eurosystem will decide on whether or not to provide a pan-European instant payment settlement service in central bank money to payment service providers.
Mr Mersch concludes: “We can look forward to 2017 being a year of decisive action for innovation in retail payments. The main deliverables at the consumer end of the payments chain are pan-European instant payment solutions and a service for (person-to-person) mobile payments using the mobile phone number as a proxy for the IBAN. In the payment service provider domain, a common set of technical, operational and business requirements for the development of an integrated market for payment initiation services is to be developed. In the market infrastructure domain, the Eurosystem is committed to taking a timely decision on whether to build a settlement service for instant payments in euro in central bank money, leveraging the pan-European nature of TARGET2.”