EBA CLEARING announced today the kick-off of an Instant Payment Task Force to support the Company’s ongoing work on the creation of a pan- European solution for instant payment processing. The major provider of pan-European payment infrastructure solutions is preparing for possible services geared at responding to instant payment-related demands by payment service providers (PSPs) in the infrastructure layer. 

EBA Clearing Instant Payment Task force

The task force, which convened for the first time last week, will in a first instance work on a roadmap and blueprint for the required deliverables. The group was set up by the EBA CLEARING Board in February 2015 and is composed of around 20 experts from EBA CLEARING user institutions.

With its instant payment initiative launched in 2014, the Company responds to a call for action by the Euro Retail Payments Board (ERPB), which has invited the supply side of the payments industry to help achieve an open and competitive market for instant payments in Europe. Based on a vision document created by the European Central Bank (ECB), the ERPB has expressed a need for at least one pan-European instant payment solution for euro open to any payment service provider (PSP) in the European Union and has invited the supply side to make an assessment of the issues related to the delivery of any such solution.

EBA CLEARING Chairman’s objective

“We have resolved to contribute to the supply side effort that a Europe- wide move to instant payments will require and we feel that a pan- European collaborative effort is the best way forward to respond positively to the call for action by the ERPB and the ECB,”said Erkki Poutiainen, Chairman of EBA CLEARING.

“After an initial evaluation done in summer 2014, we put our instant payment initiative on a fast track in late 2014 following this call for action. Together with interested users, we have begun to define the roadmap 2015 – 2018 for the delivery of an inter-PSP infrastructure solution at a pan-European level and we are working on a blueprint setting forth one or more suitable solutions by mid-2015.”