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It's also another illustration of how backwards US payments infra is. In the EU, SEPA instant payments are just that: by law it can take a maximum of 10 second
by dustintrex 5y ago
It's also another illustration of how backwards US payments infra is. In the EU, SEPA instant payments are just that: by law it can take a maximum of 10 seconds for the recipient to get paid, including across countries. And, of course, they're free.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Euro_Payments_Area https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single_Euro_Payments_Area
- toomuchtodo 5y agoThe US Federal Reserve is building an instant payment system (FedNow) that goes live in 2023 [1] [2]. Payment providers are moving upmarket and to features that stave off churn (my analysis here) due to expected revenue destruction caused by a free alternative being available (a US version of SEPA). This is alluded to in the second half of this blog post. If payment revenue (interchange and the like) declines, and net interest is insufficient for providing large swaths of US deposit accounts, something is going to have to give (community and megabanks have a ton of pull in Congress, and neobanks are beholden to someone with a bank charter). I’m not in payments (but in adjacent financial services), so I’m happy to be corrected if any of this is wrong. [1] https://www.federalreserve.gov/paymentsystems/fednow_faq.htm https://www.federalreserve.gov/paymentsystems/fednow_faq.htm [2] https://www.frbservices.org/binaries/content/assets/crsocms/financial-services/fednow/fednow-product-sheet.pdf https://www.frbservices.org/binaries/content/assets/crsocms/...
- pc86 5y agoWhat do you think is most likely to "give" in this scenario?
- supertrope 5y agoThe Durbin Amendment to Dodd-Frank capped debit interchange revenue. Bank of America responded by raising the minimum balance to qualify for no fee checking to $1500.
- morsch 5y agoMaybe they're free where you are, but apparently in Germany banks, if they support it at all, charge 0.5 EUR on average. I've never used it.
- dustintrex 5y agoTechnically the regulation says that charging is allowed, it just has to be the same flat fee across the entire SEPA zone, whether it's domestic or international. Most banks found domestic fees unpalatable, so they just made everything free. In this, as many other things when it comes to e-payments, Germany seems to be a bit of an outlier.
- nottorp 5y agoFlat fee is the keyword. Not a percentage like with cards.
- Daedren 5y agoI mean, it's the same over here in Portugal as well. SEPA standard transfers are free, but SEPA instant transfers have a flat fee in every bank (Unless you have a sort of premium account) Perhaps your country's the outlier.
- kgwgk 5y agoIf Germany is an outlier, so are France, Italy, Spain, Portugal... Germany does seem an outlier in charging as well for _incoming_ instant payments though. (I may be wrong!)
- bserge 5y agoN26, a German bank, has unlimited free ATM withdrawals in most countries and only 3/mo in Germany. If not for all the laws, this country would be USA on steroids.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- Tenoke 5y agoI don't know who supports it but I frequently wait days for SEPA transfers without seeing a more instant option in Germany. Occasionally it is instant (e.g. to those using my own bank) but I can never rely on it.
- tomp 5y agoYeah but the bank won't perform them at different hours of the day. So the transaction is practically instant, but the waiting time before the transactions starts (after you authorize it in the app) can be hours. Or instant, if you wish, for a fee.
- kerneis 5y ago> And, of course, they're free. In France, banks let you choose if you want to make an instant or regular SEPA transfer, and there's typically a 1€ fee for the instant version.