Reform of the EU Payment Services Directive

In its current version, the directive does not apply to invoicing and payment processing services procured by MNOs for third party content providers. The new bill now aims at broadening the scope of financial regulation covering all large-scale e-payment related activities. Exemptions should be reduced to micro-payments for digital content (e.g. ringtones, wallpapers, music, games, videos, or apps), the EP says in recital 13.

Generally, MNOs’ provision of mobile payment services will therefore be subject to regulation under the PSD II. Statutory exemptions provided in Art. 3 (l) of the PSD II are restricted to 

1. transactions in which the MNO merely acts as an intermediary between the content provider and a third party payment provider; and 
2. transactions provided for a subscriber as ancillary services to the MNO’s core business. 

When implementing the PSD II into national law, the Member States will therefore have to submit all MNOs’ e-payment services relating to the purchase of non-digital content (e.g. parking tickets) to respective financial regulation. Even in case of digital content, MNOs will be required to comply with regulatory obligations as soon as the billed service exceeds the above micro-payments thresholds. In Germany, for example, payment providers require a statutory permission and need to constantly maintain and demonstrate to the authority sufficient capital resources.

A final version of the PSD II could be adopted by the EU lawmakers by the end of this year.