The recast Payment Services Directive and its proposed transposition into Greek Law
(Hot Topic Article/Chapter for Greece written by Viktoria Chatzara – Senior Associate and Chloe Iordanidou – Associate, published in The Legal 500: Banking & Finance Comparative Guide, February 2018)
The recast Payment Services Directive and its proposed transposition into Greek Law
Directive 2015/2366/EC, known as the recast Payment Services Directive (PSD2), entered into force on 12.01.2016 and requires Member States to ensure
compliance with its provisions by 13.01.2018. According to its Preamble, the PSD2 seeks to achieve alignment with the developments in the market and the
emergence of new technologies and types of payment services, to ensure consumer protection against security risks and to establish transparency in the sector. Apart
from that, the amendments brought by the PSD2 were needed to modernize the previously applicable PSD (Directive 2007/64/EC) towards the integration of the
internal market for safe electronic payments.
As far as Greece is concerned, a bill implementing the PSD2 and replacing Law 3862/2010 (which transposed, among others, the PSD into Greek law) has been the
subject of a public consultation in early November. This bill consistently transposes the provisions of the Directive, corrects some failures of the existing law and
specifies certain regulatory provisions by defining the scope of the competent authorities’ powers. Until the end of 2017, the bill was not introduced to the
Parliament for discussion and voting.
Extension of scope. As PSD2 does, the bill has a wider scope than its predecessor in both geographical terms and in terms of the nature of the entities it regulates.
It applies to payment services provided in Greece. To be noted that the existing law, most probably due to a clerical error, seemed to apply to all payment services provided in the Union. Still it is unclear whether the bill applies to cover payment services provided to Greek residents only by Greek PSPs, or also by non-Greek PSPs, regardless of the residence of the service receiver.
Moreover, the bill’s provisions on the transparency of terms and information requirements cover all transactions conducted in an EEA currency not only where both the payer’s and the recipient’s PSPs, but also where only one thereof is located in the EEA. Some of the provisions contained in the bill apply to all payments between PSPs domiciled in the EEA, regardless of whether such payments are conducted on an EEA currency.
The bill covers transactions made through a commercial agent acting for both parties, and exempts such transactions only if the agent acts for one of the parties; it also provides clarifications in relation to the limited network exemption contained in the existing bill.
The Directive prohibits the provision of payment services to non-PSPs and to entities not specifically excluded by the aforementioned exemptions. A relevant prohibition has also been included in the Greek bill.
Under the Directive, Member States are to provide for penalties applicable in cases of infringement of the provisions of the Directive, as implemented into local law. Under the Greek bill, PSPs that do not comply with its general requirements are not allowed to provide payment services and the Bank of Greece (BoG) as the regulatory authority is vested with the power to impose penalties or even to revoke the license.
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