8/2/2019 The Impact of SEPA on Your Business

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The impact of SEPA on your businessFor both national and international companies, the new payment traffic market brings along both opportunities andchallenges.

New opportunities

New challengesNew opportunities for your company

SEPA payment systems deliver added value, as follows: Throughout Europe, you can receive and effect payments in euro in standard formats and subject to standard terms

and conditions.

Standard and simplified processing reduces costs and improves your companys cash flows, whilst creating greatertransparency in your cost structures.

Given that most payment transactions are automated, this will in all probability reduce cash payments.

Adjusting collection and payment procedures to SEPA can further improve all the financial processes performed bylarge companies.

The implementation of straight-through processing in international payment traffic can result in improved cashmanagement. Further benefits will result from reducing the number of interfaces.

SEPA overcomes the current absence of standardisation on direct debits (collection or direct debits), and thuscreates new sales opportunities. For all countries, there is just one product that is processed on the basis of anestablished procedure. This can create a positive stimulus for your international sales.

Given the introduction of an extensive right of repayment on European Core direct debits, this payment method willappeal even more to your debtors. This is a good opportunity to further expand your portfolio of direct debitcustomers.

Wholesale and retail traders can accept SEPA payment cards from all affiliated countries. All users of paymentservices will benefit from a unified payment market for the whole of Europe.

How does the sepa initiative affect my company?As you may know, the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) is a standard that was announced by the EuropeanPayments Council (EPC) in 2002 soon after Euro notes and coins were first introduced, for the purpose of achievinga single market in payment services. Since its official launch in 2008, SEPA has continued to gain momentum andeventually will affect every corporation, of every size, that conducts business in the SEPA area.

Although all participating countries are committed to SEPA, each one may have a different background interms of payments culture, instruments, legislation and domestic clearing arrangements. Furthermore, with millions ofcompanies and thousands of banks affected, the migration is proving to be a gradual process and full migration is

likely to take many years.

Corporations that choose to comply with SEPA standards stand to gain many benefits in terms of reducedinternal and external payment costs, increased visibility over cash and improved automation and efficiency in thepayments environment. One option that corporations can consider when adopting SEPA is connecting to the SWIFTnetwork, which can help them connect to all SEPA (and other) banks via one technical channel. When it comes toSWIFT connectivity, most companies are looking for the least costly way to connect. As such, some technologyproviders have introduced solutions that help corporations to bridge the gap between their disparate internal systemsand various SWIFT interfaces in a secure manner.

Does your company do business in the eurozone? If so, how are you handling the mandates for SEPAcompliance? Does SWIFT play a role in your plan?Access resourcesto learn more about SEPA options forconnecting to the SWIFT network.Luc Belpaire

Product Director, PaymentsSunGard AvantGard

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