CB.Net Chosen to Manage SEPA Direct Debit Repository
CB.Net has been chosen by the European Payments Council (EPC) to provide and manage the centralised repository for the EPC single euro payments area (SEPA) Credit Transfer (SCT) and SEPA Direct Debit (SDD) Schemes, referred to as the Register of Participants. The Register will provide a list of financial institutions that have signed and agreed to adhere to the rules as set out by the EPC for these schemes, which will be introduced from January 2008, with the Credit transfer launch date to be 28 January 2008. Both schemes form part of the EPC roadmap for the integration of SEPA within the banking community focusing on the continual improvement of end-to-end straight-through processing (STP) and clarification on clearing and settlements. The schemes have been designed to harmonise and standardise European transactions for both direct debits and credit transfers. The SCT and SDD initiatives will eventually replace current schemes with common business rules, data sets and standards, thus allowing banks to become more competitive within the market, with new products and services, which is another aim of SEPA. The register of participants is the only official source of SEPA adherence data that should be used by banks to validate the compliance of counterparties, and will be available from through the EPC website, as well as being automatically integrated into the CB.Net’s BankSearchPlus and The S€PA Directory.