The International Bank Account Number (IBAN) is an internationally agreed upon system of identifying bank accounts across national borders to facilitate the communication and processing of cross border transactions with a reduced risk of transcription errors. An IBAN uniquely identifies the account of a customer at a financial institution. It was originally adopted by the European Committee for Banking Standards (ECBS) and since 1997 as the international standard ISO 13616 under the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The current version is ISO 13616:2020, which indicates the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) as the formal registrar. Initially developed to facilitate payments within the European Union, it has been implemented by most European countries and numerous countries in other parts of the world, mainly in the Middle East and the Caribbean. By July 2024, 88 countries were using the IBAN numbering system.
Mobile payment, also referred to as mobile money, mobile money transfer and mobile wallet, is any of various payment processing services operated under financial regulations and performed from or via a mobile device. Instead of paying with cash, cheque, or credit card, a consumer can use a payment app on a mobile device to pay for a wide range of services and digital or hard goods. Although the concept of using non-coin-based currency systems has a long history, it is only in the 21st century that the technology to support such systems has become widely available.
A QR code is a type of two-dimensional matrix barcode, invented in 1994, by Japanese company Denso Wave for labelling automobile parts. It features black squares on a white background with fiducial markers, readable by imaging devices like cameras, and processed using Reed–Solomon error correction until the image can be appropriately interpreted. The required data is then extracted from patterns that are present in both the horizontal and the vertical components of the QR image.
A giro transfer, often shortened to giro, is a payment transfer between current bank accounts and initiated by the payer, not the payee. The debit card has a similar model. Giros are primarily used in Europe; although electronic payment systems exist in the United States, it is not possible to perform third-party transfers with them. In the European Union, the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) allows electronic giro or debit card payments in euros to be executed to any euro bank account in the area.
Sort codes are the domestic bank codes used to route money transfers between financial institutions in the United Kingdom, and formerly in the Republic of Ireland. They are six-digit hierarchical numerical addresses that specify clearing banks, clearing systems, regions, large financial institutions, groups of financial institutions and ultimately resolve to individual branches. In the UK they continue to be used to route transactions domestically within clearance organizations and to identify accounts, while in the Republic of Ireland they have been deprecated and replaced by the Single European Payment Area (SEPA) systems and infrastructure.
Friendly fraud, also known as chargeback fraud occurs when a consumer makes an online shopping purchase with their own credit card, and then requests a chargeback from the issuing bank after receiving the purchased goods or services. Once approved, the chargeback cancels the financial transaction, and the consumer receives a refund of the money they spent. Dependent on the payment method used, the merchant can be accountable when a chargeback occurs.
The Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) is a payment integration initiative of the European Union for simplification of bank transfers denominated in euros. As of 2020, there were 36 members in SEPA, consisting of the 27 member states of the European Union, the four member states of the European Free Trade Association, and the United Kingdom. Some microstates participate in the technical schemes: Andorra, Monaco, San Marino, and Vatican City.
Network for Electronic Transfers, colloquially known as NETS, is a Singaporean electronic payment service provider. Founded in 1986 by a consortium of local banks, it aims to establish the debit network and drive the adoption of electronic payments in Singapore. It is owned by DBS Bank, OCBC Bank and United Overseas Bank (UOB).
The Electronic Banking Internet Communication Standard (EBICS) is a German transmission protocol developed by the German Banking Industry Committee for sending payment information between banks, as well as between banks and client applications, over the Internet. It grew out of the earlier BCS-FTAM protocol that was developed in 1995, with the aim of being able to use Internet connections and TCP/IP. It is mandated for use by German banks and has also been adopted by France, Switzerland and Austria. Adoptions in different countries have resulted in specific operations being permitted by some banks while being disallowed by others.
National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is an Indian public sector company that operates retail payments and settlement systems in India. The organization is an initiative of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Indian Banks' Association (IBA) under the provisions of the Payment and Settlement Systems Act, 2007, for creating a robust payment and settlement infrastructure in India.
The German Banking Industry Committee (GBIC), known until 2011 as the Central Credit Committee is an industry association of the German banking industry. Its decisions are held normative for the national banking sector – either directly by interbank treaties or indirectly by preparing a corresponding ministerial or Bundesbank decision.
Payments as a service (PaaS) is a marketing phrase used to describe software as a service to connect a group of international payment systems. The architecture is represented by a layer – or overlay – that resides on top of these disparate systems and provides for two-way communications between the payment system and the PaaS. Communication is governed by standard APIs created by the PaaS provider.
EBA Clearing is a provider of pan-European payment infrastructure wholly owned by shareholders that consist of major European banks.
A QR code payment is a mobile payment method where payment is performed by scanning a QR code from a mobile app. This is an alternative to doing electronic funds transfer at point of sale using a payment terminal. This avoids a lot of the infrastructure traditionally associated with electronic payments such as payment cards, payment networks, payment terminal and merchant accounts.
The European Payments Initiative (EPI), previously known as the Pan-European Payments System Initiative (PEPSI), is a unified digital payment service backed by 16 European banks and payment service providers. Its aim is to allow European consumers and merchants to make next-generation payments for all types of person-to-person transfers and retail transactions via a digital wallet, called Wero. Wero is based on instant account-to-account payments and will eliminate intermediaries in the payment chain and associated costs.
Contactless dining is a restaurant dine-in experience that allows a guest to view the menu, place orders, and make payments without interacting closely with a server or touching shared public surfaces. The form of dining has emerged in global popularity during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Quick Response Code Indonesia Standard is an Indonesian QR code standard developed by Bank Indonesia (BI) and Indonesian Payment System Association for cashless payments in Indonesia.
QR Ph is the standardized quick-response code system adopted in the Philippines, which is based on the Europay-Mastercard-VISA (EMV) standard. It serves as a swift and secure payment method for customers of both participating banks and non-bank electronic money issuers (EMI) in the country. Through QR Ph, users can conduct various transactions, including payments, fund transfers, and receipts from bank and e-money accounts within the Philippines. The implementation of QR Ph has been officially endorsed by Philippine Payments Management, Inc., following guidelines set forth in Circular 1055 by the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP).
The STET-CORE system is a French interbank automated clearing house that has been designated as a Systemically Important Payment System at the European level. STET, the name of the operating company, refers to Systèmes Technologiques d'Echange et de Traitement, and CORE, the name of the infrastructure itself, refers to COmpensation REtail.
Wero is a European mobile payment system intended to replace Giropay in Germany, Paylib in France, Payconiq in Belgium and Luxembourg and iDEAL in The Netherlands. The service was launched on 2 July 2024 by the European Payments Initiative. The service intends to compete with PayPal and similar services, beginning as a real-time payment system and later with extended online payment function.
