BRUSELAS, 26 Oct. (EUROPA PRESS) -
The European Commission presented this Wednesday a proposal to oblige banks to offer their customers the possibility of making instant payments in less than ten seconds and any day of the week throughout the European Union, after verifying that this service, possible through platforms such as Bizum, barely represents 11% of the transfers made in euros each year.
"Money should be able to change hands quickly, with a click", defended the Commissioner for Financial Services, Mairead McGuinness, who explained that Brussels proposes binding rules because evolution has not occurred naturally and "if left to hands of the market it could take a decade" for immediate payments to become the norm. The details of the proposal must now be negotiated between the European Parliament and the Twenty-seven before it sees the light.
Instant payment services have penetrated very unevenly in the countries of the European Union, with a third of the countries where this possibility does not even exist and several where the commissions charged by payment institutions exceed those imposed on payments. conventional.
For this reason, Brussels wants to set a cap on the commissions that the payment server may charge for pressing the operation in euros, so that in no case can it be higher than the cost of a classic transfer managed by the same entity.
Entities will also be required to guarantee the universal availability of instant payments in euros, with the obligation for payment service providers in the European Union that already offer the possibility of transfers in euros that take the step to include the instant in a closed deadline.
Another key to promoting instant payments in the eyes of community services is to reinforce the security of these processes to gain the trust of customers, whether they are individuals or companies.
For this reason, the new rule will require, for example, that suppliers must check before executing the payment that the bank account number (IBAN) and the beneficiary number correspond in order to alert the latter in the event of error or fraud. .
Finally, the community proposal wants to streamline European control procedures to filter the names of people who are subject to sanctions from the European Union and, therefore, have their assets frozen in community territory. To this end, Brussels proposes that entities be able to update their clients' data in relation to sanctions at least once a day to avoid having to waste time checking that factor in each instant transfer, because that control would prevent the operation from being carried out in seconds.
In this sense, the Community Executive recalls that only 9.4% of current transfers are rejected and, in 99.8% of cases, it is for the wrong reason.
