All documents pertaining to the EPC schemes are published on the EPC website, and anyone interested in the schemes should find in this documentation the answers to their questions.
If you have any unanswered questions, you can follow the procedures below.
The EPC payment schemes are updated every two years to reflect market needs and technological changes. This change-management process is transparent and open: any stakeholder can contribute, suggest change requests and participate in public consultations. If you wish to have a say on the evolution of the EPC payment schemes, read more about the evolution of the schemes.
If you need a clarification on a specific section of the EPC scheme rulebooks, implementation guidelines or other documents, you can contact the EPC.
You are a scheme participant
The EPC Dispute Resolution Committee (DRC) is responsible for complaints management and appeals for all EPC-managed schemes. This includes investigating breaches or potential breaches of the EPC scheme rulebooks following a complaint made by a scheme participant.
Scheme participants wishing to file a complaint against another scheme participant may contact the DRC secretariat.
Sanctions issued by the DRC can be found here.
Further information is available in the Dispute Resolution Committee Mandate.
You are not a scheme participant (for example, a consumer, a retailer, etc).
- Your complaint is related to the service offered by your payment service provider (PSP).
You should first contact your PSP, then, if need be, the competent public and / or private complaint-handling bodies in your country. The list of competent and out-of-court complaint bodies in the European Union may be consulted on the European Commission’s website (list of competent authorities, and out-of-court complaint and redress bodies). - Your complaint is of scheme-wide importance.
Only if you have a complaint that by its very nature is of scheme-wide importance should you submit your complaint for consideration to the EPC. Complaints are understood to be of scheme-wide importance if they could be seen as creating reputational damage to the scheme or if they could negatively affect the integrity or proper functioning of the scheme. The EPC may refuse complaints if it reaches the conclusion that they do not qualify as being of scheme-wide importance. In this situation, the complainant is invited to follow the process described in the previous point.
Upon request, the rulebooks and the related implementation guidelines can be licensed by the EPC for their use and distribution outside SEPA but only for other currencies than the Euro.
The License will grant the licensees a royalty-free, non-exclusive right to use, copy, amend, translate and distribute the rulebooks in their original or adapted form.
The Payment Scheme Fraud Prevention Working Group (PSFPWG) was established as part of the EPC’s active contribution to payment fraud prevention, notably on operational aspects with the ultimate aim to enhance the safety of the EPC payment schemes. To support the collective fight against payment fraud the EPC launched an online fraud information exchange platform. For more information, SEPA payment scheme participants can contact us at [email protected].