Trilogue Recommendations on PSD3/PSR - Ensuring Legal Certainty for E-Money Distribution

The trilogue negotiations on PSD3 and PSR are a decisive moment to ensure that millions of Europeans can continue to buy, gift, and use simple electronic money products such as prepaid vouchers and gift cards. These products are not just a convenience, they are a tool of financial inclusion, offering an easy, cash-like solution for people without bank accounts or credit cards, and a trusted gift or budgeting tool for millions of households.

E-money products are available at over 800.000 retail outlets across the EU, from supermarkets and petrol stations to local shops. These outlets are not providing payment services; they are simply offering consumers access to popular and trusted products. If PSD3 creates unnecessary complexity by misclassifying such actors, consumers risk losing access to these products and SMEs face disproportionate new burdens.

This industry coalition of electronic money issuers, distributors, and retailers therefore urges co-legislators to consider the following:

• ensure clarity: Retain Council’s Recital 45 and Article 20(4) to confirm that the selling, distribution, and redemption of e-money do not constitute payment services and therefore are not agent activities;
• consistency: Add “redemption” explicitly to Article 20(4) to align with Recital 45;
• avoid unnecessary burdens: Remove the legal notion of “distributor” to prevent disproportionate compliance costs for retailers and SMEs that only sell or redeem e-money vouchers or gift cards.