Today the European Payments Council (EPC) Board has approved the inclusion of Montenegro and Albania in the geographical scope of the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) payment schemes.
The geographical scope of the SEPA payment schemes now covers 38 countries.
As a result, all existing EPC payment scheme participants should be able to send or to receive SEPA Credit Transfer (SCT), SEPA Instant Credit Transfer (SCT Inst) and SEPA Direct Debit (SDD) transactions to and from SCT, SCT Inst and SDD scheme participants from Montenegro and Albania as of when their financial institutions will have adhered to the respective scheme(s).
The adherence of Montenegrin and Albanian financial institutions to the SEPA payment schemes, according to the EPC calendar, will be enabled starting from April 2025, while the Operational Readiness Date (ORD) for payment service providers (PSPs) from Montenegro and Albania will be communicated later by the EPC.