Published on Friday, June 04, 2010
As part of the opening address, EBA chairman Hansjörg Nymphius told delegates he believed the foundations of SEPA had been laid, but now was the time to build.
One of the key issues facing a unanimous implementation of SEPA seems to be the varying priority levels which have been allocated to it within Euro member countries. Since SEPA will provide untold benefits once up and running, it is particularly frustrating to see that collaborative agreements are proving so difficult to reach.
To back this up, Werner Steinmueller, a member of the group executive committee at Deutsche Bank, claimed that while Italy has 30% SEPA acceptance, Germany has less than one per cent - proof of the contrasting interests across the continent.
For all of its potential, the SEPA project has been a much-maligned affair since it was introduced in 2008. Deadlines and agreements were made and subsequently not followed through, causing the scheme to falter. As a result, it has since fallen by the wayside.
If tentative steps can be taken towards progressing SEPA, there's no doubt that it has the capability to make complicated European payments a thing of the past.
