PSD2 is the new European Directive on payment services in the European market. It concerns both retail and corporate payments, with the main objectives of improving competition, transparency and providing innovative solutions for the benefit of consumers while enhancing the security of online payments.
In the context of the continuous upgrade of its services and the commitment to provide high quality solutions to its customers, Cooperative Bank of Karditsa has developed special Application Planning Interfaces (APIs), which cover a set of services such as:
Account Information Services (AIS): provision of payments bank account information, list of available accounts, account balance, transaction analysis
Payment Initiation Services (PIS): initiation of an electronic payment, credit transfer, direct debit, order renewal or cancellation, payment status check
Payment Instrument Issuer Service (PIIS): Provide cash availability confirmation.
For their implementation, Cooperative Bank of Karditsa has made available a test portal (sandbox), and the production environment (API portal) as of 24/5/2019. API portals provide to Third Party Providers (TPPs), such as Account Information Service Providers (AISPs) and Payment Initiation Service Providers (PISPs), information about connecting to custom interfaces and the ability to test their applications in the sandbox test environment.
TPPs act as intermediaries between the customer and the Bank, and they can be certified application developers, FinTech businesses or even other Banks. The customer can choose any certified TPP he wishes in order to use the services, however his explicit consent is required, while the bank's provided strong customer authentication procedures apply.
