consumer
Online integration of the Girocard in the second half of the year
Many online shops have several payment methods – according to the will of the banks and savings banks, Giropay should soon be an established alternative. Photo: Silas Stein/dpa
© dpa-infocom GmbH
The domestic credit industry is further interlinking its various offers for online payments. The Girocard will also be integrated soon. The competition user numbers are still significantly higher.
One year after the starting signal, Germany’s banks and savings banks are preparing the next step to standardize their online payment processes.
“The contractual and technical foundations for the integration of the digital Girocard are currently being created,” said the German banking industry (DK) when asked. “The integration of the Girocard as a further access route in the online payment method Giropay should start in the second half of the year.”
First, this digital Girocard will be available to customers of the cooperative financial group, and then to savings bank customers by the end of the current year, “before it is rolled out to other groups of institutions,” explained the five banking associations organized in the DK. This year’s DK leader is the Federal Association of German Banks (BdB). The completion of the integration of the digital Girocard in online trading is “expected in the second half of 2022”.
More competition for Paypal?
In March of last year, the associations announced that they would merge their online payment methods Paydirekt, Giropay and Kwitt under the Giropay brand. From May 10, 2021, consumers were introduced to the new brand in a transition phase lasting several months.
Public-law, cooperative and private institutes want to enable consumers by merging the payment methods to pay online as easily as possible and to transfer money quickly from account to account – regardless of which bank the account is ultimately held with. Ultimately, the domestic credit industry wants to establish an alternative to Paypal, Apple Pay and Co.
«The market for payment methods is highly competitive. It is all the more important – especially with a view to a piece of national independence – that we as the German banking industry can offer customers a sustainable national payment method,” affirmed the industry associations.
Targeted strong user growth
According to Paydirekt, the operating company responsible for merging the online payment processes of banks and savings banks in Germany, the savings bank finance group, the cooperative finance group, Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank “almost the entire German banking industry with a total of around 1,500 banks and savings banks is involved in the implementation measures involved”.
According to the information, the new Giropay process has around 7.5 million users so far. You can pay in this way in more than 27,000 online shops and in more than 1,400 municipalities. When they started a year ago, Giropay and Paydirekt together covered around two percent of the German market for online payments. According to the statements made at the time, the domestic industry saw potential in the medium term to increase its market share to up to 50 percent. For comparison: According to the latest information, the US competitor Paypal has more than 29 million active customers in Germany.