Who will Benefit Most from the EU Single Payment Area? 20 March 2006 La Bibliothèque Solvay
“ It will require a major effort from the 8,000 banks to put the system in place.” Guido de Ravoet
The debate on the Single European Payments Area (SEPA) produced a lively discussion, much of it centred on whether the project was on schedule. The European Banking Federation’s (FBE’s) Secretary General Guido Ravoet did admit that there had been slippage but he insisted that the banks were fully committed to the project. Visa’s Johannes Van der Velde was firm. The project was behind schedule but it wasn’t just the fault of the banks. He wanted a harmonised legislative system as a pre-requisite to SEPA. Van der Velde could see no business case for the banks, while the Commission’s David Deacon wanted more competition in order to bring down the cost of bank accounts. Deacon saw benefits for everyone, banks included. Many benefits were produced by the speakers and many euros of saving announced. Van der Velde did not agree, they were the losses that the banks would suffer. MEP Sophia Helena In't Veld felt the introduction of SEPA would be a boost to the single market and to cross-border trade. She was not impressed by forecasts that hardly anyone was interested in cross-border trade, and used the immense amount of trade on the Internet to back her arguments. The questions from the floor were numerous and opinions diverged, but no one would state that the 2010 deadline would not be met.