What is PSD2 

Payment Services Directive (PSD2) complements the EU rules to enable new players and existing services to grow payment instruments and access to payment accounts.

The first Payment Services Directive (PSD1) was adopted in 2007. This legislation provides the legal foundation for an EU single market for payments, to establish safer and more innovative payment services across the EU. The objective was to make cross-border payments as easy, efficient and secure as ‘national’ payments within a Member State.

It offered economies of scale and helped the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) in practice. The Commission proposed to review PSD1 to modernise it to take account of new types of payment services, such as payment initiation services.

The revised Payment Services Directive (PSD2), from 2015, updates and complements the EU rules put in place by the Payment Services Directive (PSD1). Its main objectives are to:

. Contribute to a more integrated and efficient European payments market

. Improve the level playing field for payment service providers (including new players)

. Make payments safer and more secure

. Protect consumers

PSD2 widens the scope of PSD1 by covering new services and players as well as by extending the scope of existing services (payment instruments issued by payment service providers that do not manage the account of the payment service user), enabling their access to payment accounts.