12 September 2006

ECON adopted Payment Services Directive

European Parliaments ECON Committee adopted unanimously with just one abstention the proposal for the Payment Services Directive amending mainly a more limited scope, requirements regarding added capital and a longer payment deadline than that proposed by the Commission. More than 600 amendments were posted.

The scope of the directive was limited solely to service providers established in the EU. EP rapporteur Gauzes argued that the Commission proposal was at least premature if not unrealistic.

With regard to greater competition in order to cut the cost of payment services, MEPs agreed to the creation of new payment establishments'. However, the Committee introduced requirements concerning initial capital for the entry of new economic players, setting thresholds from 100,000 to 500,000 Euro, except with regard to cash-cash transfers conducted within 24 hours.

These provisions were debated at length by the Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee. There are already innumerable payment establishments, especially in the United Kingdom and the Netherlands, and both countries take a very dim view of this harmonisation of the sector.

With regard to the issue of the payment deadline for cross-border transactions the Committee split the original D+1 rule, introducing a deadline of D+2 from 2010 and D+1 from 2014.

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