PRESS RELEASE
National Payment System Committee holds the second meeting

On 24 May 2016, the National Payment Systems Committee (NPSC) held its second meeting, at the premises of the Bank of Albania. The NPSC meeting was presided by Ms Elisabeta Gjoni, the First Deputy Governor of the Bank of Albania, who is also the chairperson of the NPSC. In addition to NPSC members from: Bank of Albania, Ministry of Finance, Minister for Innovation and Public Administration, Ministry of Economic Development, Tourism, Trade and Entrepreneurship, Albanian Financial Supervision Authority, Ministry of Internal Affairs, and the Albanian Association of Banks, Ms Maria Teresa Chimienti and Mr Nenad Bosiljcic, from the WB Payment Systems Development Group attended the meeting.

Representatives of non-bank financial institutions, national operators of card payment schemes and utility companies were also invited to the meeting.

In the opening address, the Deputy Governor Gjoni highlighted the role of the payment systems and instruments in the economic activity and the importance of the NPSC in the coordination of inter-institutional policies in this field. Mr Gjoni noted the projects that the Bank of Albania plans to undertake with the World Bank Group in the framework of promoting the security and effectiveness of payment systems and instruments.

In her address, Minister Harito presented the recent developments in projects undertaken by the Ministry in the framework of digitalising governmental services. She considered the establishment of the communication bridges between the utility companies and commercial banks as particularly important for their realisation. In this regard, Ms Harito highlighted that the promotion of innovative payment channels, such as via mobile phones, are viewed as the future of payments. Concluding, Ms Harito pointed out the importance of the electronic signature for banking services.

Ms Elona Gjebrea, Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs discussed on the developments in the project of the Ministry of Internal Affairs on the electronic register of the Civil Status Registry and Addresses describing the key functionalities and benefits, with the banking system being one of the interested parties.

Mr Ervin Mete, Deputy Minister of Economic Development, Trade, Tourism and Entrepreneurship presented the competences of the Ministry in the framework of consumer's protection for banking and financial services, and the need to cooperate in the framework of establishing the structures and procedures similar to those of the European Union. In this regard, Deputy Minister Mete emphasised the need for cooperation between the Bank and the MEDTTE on the transpositions of some important directives and regulations in this field.

Furthermore, the Bank of Albania introduced the progress of the three projects deriving from conclusions of the first meeting. In concrete terms, for standardising payment orders, the agreed form, based on the SEPA' standards was introduced. Related to the interbank debiting, the so far success and the further steps needed to finalise this project were introduced. The Albanian Association of Banks presented the findings from the measurement of EUR- denominated payments costs, highlighting that the use of correspondent banks, not only have considerable costs, but also encourage the use of cash, thus generating high costs to the banking system in terms of cash management.

Also, in the meeting was highlighted once more the fact that the legal and regulatory framework of the Bank of Albania does not create barriers to the implementation of the electronic signature. The Bank of Albania affirmed that it will undertake all the necessary measures in this regard.

At the end, the World Bank Group representatives introduced the preliminary results of the survey on the costs of payment instruments from the demand side. The findings of this survey point to the fact that cash is the most costly payment instrument and the shift from cash to electronic payments may help to considerably increasing the effective productivity.

At the end of the meeting, the representatives of non-bank financial institutions welcomed the initiative and provided their comments. They identified some aspects of collaboration to increase in the future.

After the meeting, the participants visited the Museum of the Bank of Albania, commending this initiative of the Bank of Albania.

'SEPA - Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) is an EU public authorities' integration initiative in the area of electronic euro payments.