In brick-and-mortar retail, the EC card or Girocard is very popular in Germany. In the growing online business, however, the US group PayPal is currently the leading force. As the “Handelsblatt” reports, German banks now want to change this.
In addition, the EC card should be able to be stored in the Giropay online payment process in the future. So far, however, this has been used very little. For this step, the two companies behind the offers could be brought together. Paydirekt operates Giropay and Euro Kartensysteme (EKS) is the developer of the Girocard.
The 1×1 of investing in shares
The step would be surprising, since the EC card seems to be becoming more and more obsolete in Germany. Banks are increasingly turning to other alternatives such as Visa or Mastercard.
However, numerous questions, including those relating to personnel and strategic orientation, must be clarified. Some stakeholders consider this effort to be too great.
The different smartphone operating systems are also problematic. With iPhones, the Girocard can currently only be deposited with Apple Pay. Only the savings banks have taken this route so far.
Depositing in Giropay would currently only be possible with Android. Here, however, there is the problem that a separate app is required to confirm the payment. Many banks do not have this yet.
Many savings banks and Volksbanks are currently testing another alternative. They equip the Girocard with Mastercard functions. This makes payments on the Internet and abroad much easier. However, the banks are making themselves dependent on the US provider.
The European Payment Initiative (EPI) is actually intended to establish a European payment system as a counterweight to Mastercard, Visa and PayPal. However, progress here is very slow. After all German banks initially took part in the project, Commerzbank withdrew at the beginning of the year. The future is therefore still uncertain.
Recently it became known that Lufthansa is taking 900 flights from Frankfurt and Munich out of the programme. According to a media report, the airline is now canceling another 2,200 flights – in the holiday months of July and August.
The federal government calls the alarm level in the “gas emergency plan”. In the “heute journal” interview with Marietta Slomka, Economics Minister Robert Habeck (Green Party) calls on companies and consumers to save gas. On the other hand, he doesn’t think much of financial incentives, as a flippant answer shows.
There was a death in Bamberg’s “Bambados” stadium pool on Thursday morning. A visitor collapsed near the showers. The police have started their investigation at the scene. The swimming pool is closed until further notice.
The original of this article “Sparkassen and other German banks plan to modernize the EC card” comes from chip.de.
