European Parliament
A7-0292/2011
Elena Băsescu  (PPE ).
(RO)
Madam President, Europe needs reliable and efficient payment systems to ensure the proper functioning of the single market. National plans are unable to provide sufficient impetus to achieve a rapid, complete migration to the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA). SEPA is the basic component used to create an internal payments market. It will help cut costs and enable significant savings to be made. For example, the potential benefits from SEPA could amount to EUR 300 billion within six years.
It is important to set a common deadline for the migration of direct debits and credit transfers in euros. At the same time, multilateral interchange fees for direct debits need to be regulated. However, I think that greater efforts need to be made to promote SEPA products actively.

