Government approves law on capping cash payments, interbank fees

Romanian government approved the draft law on capping cash payments and reducing interbank fees for debit and credit cards transactions, according to official sources quoted by MEDIAFAX.

The Ministry of Finances drafted the project that will limit interbank fees to 0.2 percent for debit cards and 0.3 percent for credit cards, after the measures were initially suggested in an emergency ordinance project.

Not applying the limitations would attract fines from RON 10,000 to 200,000.

Capping the commissions, a measure announced at the end of January, was met with a prompt reaction from the banking system which lobbied for the Government to drop the project. Mastercard and Visa joined in after the project went into public debate, and warned that the cap may have negative effects. On the other hand, the big retailer approve of the reduced commissions, saying that the market for debit and credit cards would remain profitable, even without the interbank fees.

Validating the measures through a law project means the Government alone can not sign off on them without an agreement from the Parliament. The law will pass through the Legislative apparatus and then be sent to the President and it could suffer several modifications.

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Cash payments limited t0 RON 5,000 / day

The Government also approved the law to strengthen financial discipline in cash payments and transactions. According to the project, the limitation will be extended to individuals and not just companies: PFA (authorized persons), individual enterprises, family enterprises, freelancers and independent workers will also be subjected to the same limitation.

The maximum daily quota for cash payments is RON 5,000 / person but no more than a total quota of RON 10,000 / day.