What has happened?

The Bank of Italy has issued a communication indicating that 31 December 2020 will be the final deadline to adopt strong customer authentication (SCA) requirements in relation to online card payment transactions under PSD2.

What does this mean?

The Bank of Italy will approach relevant payment service providers and require them to share a detailed migration plan, to be completed by 31 December 2020 at the latest, also including initiatives toward customers.

The above-mentioned communication follows the Bank of Italy notice of August 2019, by which the Italian regulator provided for the possibility to request additional time for the implementation of SCA requirements and the European Banking Authority (EBA) opinion on the deadline for the migration to SCA for e-commerce card-based payment transactions of October 2019, by which the EBA set the deadline to 31 December 2020 as well as the expected actions to be taken during the migration period.

Next steps

We advise major financial institutions, tech firms and FinTech start-ups, bringing a fully integrated, multi-disciplinary approach to our advice, drawing on our experience in payment services, banking and finance regulation, so please let us know if you have any questions on the Bank of Italy's announcement or how to prepare for the deadline or any other issues mentioned in this article.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.