Commission seeks comments on working paper on SEPA end-date

An assessment carried out by the European Commission in cooperation with the European Central Bank has concluded that market migration from legacy to SEPA systems requires the mandatory end-dates for both credit transfers and direct debits.

“The market can not manage migration alone” the EU Executive states in a working paper published on 2 June and invites stakeholders to comment on a number of topics elaborated upon in the document. These include the, inter alia, the setting of separate end-dates for credit transfers and direct debits, the scope of payment services covered and the possibility of allowing waivers for certain niche-products.

In December 2009, the ECOFIN Council had invited the Commission to carry out an assessment on the subject matter, which was backed by MEPs in March of this year in a Resolution calling upon the European Commission “to set a clear, appropriate and binding end-date, which should be no later than 31 December 2012”.

Both the take-up of SEPA credit transfers (SCTs) as well as the SEPA direct debit scheme (SDD), launched in November 2009, have been rather slow and can so far not be characterized as very successful. ECB statistics reveal that the use of SCTs only amounted to an unsatisfactory 7.5% of the overall credit transfer volume in the euro-area in March 2010.

The announcement comes days before of the newly established SEPA Council, a governing body under the joint chairmanship of the European Commission and the European Central Bank, will get together for the first time in Brussels.