The European Payments Initiative (EPI) is an initiative backed by 16 European banks and financial services companies to offer Wero, an payment solution…

  • Classy Hatter@sopuli.xyzEnglish
    16·
    3 days ago

    Bancomat, Bizum, SIBS-MB WAY and Vipps MobilePay (all of which are members of the EuroPA Alliance) and EPI Company (EPI) jointly announce today the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU), marking a decisive step towards strengthening Europe’s payment sovereignty.

    At launch, the initiative will span 13 European countries[1], collectively already covering ~72% of the European Union and Norway population. The coalition is open to all European countries, including Switzerland and other non-euro markets

    Following the MoU, the partners will establish the central interoperability entity by H1 2026, will start preparing the technical implementation of the target set-up, and conduct proof‑of‑concepts (PoCs) in parallel.

    Coverage of all use cases is intented by 2027 through a phased rollout:

    • In 2026: rollout of peer-to-peer (P2P) cross-border payments

    • In 2027: rollout of e-commerce and point-of-sale (POS) payments

    [1] Andorra, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain and Sweden.

  • fonix232@fedia.io
    15·
    3 days ago

    What Europe needs is its own payment card network to step up against the quasi dupoly of MasterCard and Visa (AmEx and Discovery aren’t that widely used or even available in Europe)

    • Librerian@lemmy.zipEnglish
      4·
      3 days ago

      Norway already has the BankAxept system in wide use. It is mainly used with debit cards though, as far as I know, not credit cards. The fees for using BankAxept are lower than Visa/Mastercard for the merchants, and most debit cards from Norwegian banks have a combination of Visa/Mastercard and BankAxept functionality included. Most merchant terminals are set up to prefer the latter tech, falling back to Visa/MC if the card isn’t BankAxept equipped.

      So some of the tech is already there.

    • bossito@lemmy.worldEnglish
      1·
      3 days ago

      I assume the investment for that would be too high on a technology/system that might have its days numbered alrsady…

  • testaccount372920@piefed.zipEnglish
    5·
    3 days ago

    The Dutch banks have started replacing iDeal with Wero as of this year. So far it appears to only be a change of the logo and I think it will be fully adopted in a year or so.

  • cornishon@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
    11·
    3 days ago

    Call me skeptical, but back in Trump 1 times EU was very loud about a need for “independent alternative financial transaction system” too. They even created it, performed 1 (one) transaction and then quietly shut it down after a year.

  • g4br13l@piefed.socialEnglish
    2·
    3 days ago

    In Switzerland we have Twint, it’s widely used, most people have it and use it daily, I’m shocked they didn’t try to jump into it with the other ones