Stavroula Kampouridou, CEO of DIAS SA, had the opportunity to highlight the great moment for instant payments expected to flourish further in the near future, during her participation in the panel discussion entitled: “Brainstorm Finance - A New Era of Innovation”, in the context of The Fortune Greece CEO Initiative 2023, held on November 9, 2023 in Athens.

Specifically, as she mentioned, the European Council and the European Parliament recently reached a political agreement aiming to close the gap of use between instant payments and traditional credit transfers to all European banks, while the Hellenic Ministry of Economy and Finance put a draft law on consultation. According to the draft law it becomes mandatory for self-employed professionals to accept instant payment services as a means of payment, complementary to cards. Also, self-employed professionals are obliged to inform of the use of such payment means as well as to display this option followed by the brand name of the instant payment solution in a conspicuous place at the company’s cash desk and on the website via which payments are made.

The CEO of DIAS SA stated: “This is a crucial decision in the payments environment, and is expected to improve the provision and availability of the full potential of instant payments by consumers, as well as businesses, both in Greece and the rest of European countries. In the same context, customers have the opportunity to carry out transactions instantly through their bank or Payment Service Providers”.

Since December 2021, DIAS SA has successfully completed the direct connection of the domestic payment system with the European Central Bank’s Target Instant Payment Settlement (TIPS) system. This initiative enables the vast majority of payment accounts in the Greek financial system to be functional to exchange instant payments both domestically and on a pan-European level, through DIAS. Essentially, these were the “rails” leading to the TIPS instant payment system, to which the Bank of Greece is also interconnected, through DIAS, allowing instant fund collections to the public sector.

Intuitive payments are the future

Referring to the family of IRIS services, which consists of IRIS Person-to-Person (P2P), IRIS Person-to-Business (P2B) and IRIS eCommerce, Stavroula Kampouridou noted that until 2021, a clear strategy has not been put in place concerning the presentation and further promotion of IRIS services in the market, under a common brand name. This resulted in a significant gap in relationto the real dynamics of the services. “This, along with the active promotion of IRIS Payments by the Greek banks, the improvement of certain technical features, as well as the user experience, and the enrichment of its services, all within the mobile apps of the banks, has allowed us to dynamically move towards a positive direction, recoding continuous three-digit growth rates of IRIS services”.

Thus, she stressed that the greatest challenge that DIAS SA and its members will face in the near future is the adoption and implementation of intuitive payments, i.e. payments to be made instantly, easily and without requiring the user’s active involvement as a prerequisite. This facilitates the adoption of IRIS services by all generations, given that 70% of current users are 18 to 34-year-olds.