EPC API-based schemes
The payment-related schemes developed by the European Payments Council (EPC) - Verification Of Payee (VOP), SEPA Payment Account Access (SPAA) and SEPA Request-to-Pay (SRTP) - mandate the use of Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) for sending and receiving messages. The technical specifications of the APIs are either developed by the EPC (e.g. for VOP and SRTP) or by other market actors (e.g. for SPAA) on the basis of the EPC scheme rulebooks.
In API-based schemes, two scheme participants may communicate through APIs either directly or through a proxy, e.g. a Routing and/or Verification Mechanism (RVM) in the VOP scheme, and a Referenced Technical Service Provider (RTSP) in the SRTP scheme. Before this API-based communication may take place, however, all scheme participants in the network need to know how to reach each other (i.e. the network address of the other party) and have all the information needed to interoperate (e.g. knowing which options may be supported by the other party).
For this purpose, the EPC introduced the EPC Directory Service (EDS). This directory service is the default mechanism to facilitate reachability and interoperability across all API-based EPC scheme participants.
The EDS is a centralised platform storing all EPC scheme participants’ information needed to securely identify and authorise the scheme participant, and to secure reachability and interoperability at scheme level, that is:
- For each EPC scheme participant, and depending on the scheme, the EDS records:
- Unique identification and authorisation data, e.g. BIC, LEI, National Authorisation Number (NAN), etc.
- Routing (reachability) data, e.g. the Unique Resource Indicator (URI) or API end-point
- Interoperability data, e.g. options supported by the scheme participants - EPC scheme participants don’t need to query the EDS for each transaction, but have the possibility to download a copy of the EDS and cache it locally. In this way, the EDS does not represent an operational bottleneck for the scheme, neither a potential single point of failure.
- Importantly, no personal data of individual or enterprise end-users (e.g., IBAN, email addresses, mobile numbers etc.) is going to be stored into the EDS, but only identification and routing data related to PSPs (Banks, E-Money Institutions and Payment Institutions) will be recorded.
The main functions of the EDS are:
- Scheme participants’ adherence data is automatically imported into the EDS from the EPC official Register of Participants.
- Authorised users (scheme participants and authorised proxies) are able to access through a Graphical User Interface (Web GUI) or via EDS APIs, so to update and manage EPC scheme participants’ data,
- Authorised users are able to download the EDS data and cache in a local data file.
The EPC together with the selected EDS supplier is currently focused on finalising the design of the EDS and strives to launch the EDS in September 2025 to ensure its full availability in “live” mode by the time the VOP scheme enters into force on 5 October 2025.
It is expected that the EPC releases the EDS in “pilot” mode, in two phases starting from May 2025.
The EPC is progressively delivering the documentation of the EDS to be used by scheme participants and their technical providers.
The EPC has published the following documentation items:
- The specifications of the EDS Local File
- The EDS Graphical User Interface (GUI) guidelines
- EDS API Specifications
Other documents coming soon.