A sale confirmed, a notification received, funds available within seconds: for a merchant, the promise of instant transfers is tangible. But receiving money faster is not enough to keep a shop running. Merchants need to identify which order has been paid for, handle refunds, spot attempted fraud and feed data into their accounting systems. Looking ahead to September 2026, this chain of services is emerging as the battleground for banks, fintechs and payment acceptance specialists. This analysis is based on the European framework adopted in 2024 and its known deadlines; the commercial outlook remains a set of scenarios, not established outcomes.
The regulation makes speed the standard
For a long time, instant transfers resembled a premium option: convenient, but sometimes subject to a fee, unevenly available and rarely integrated into the purchasing process. The European regulation on instant euro payments changes that logic. For the euro-area providers concerned, the main deadlines are 9 January 2025 for receiving payments and 9 October 2025 for sending them, with specific timetables for certain categories of institutions. Among other requirements, the regulation stipulates execution within ten seconds, around the clock.
Another shift: charges for an instant transfer cannot exceed those for a comparable standard transfer. This does not mean that all payment services become free. It does, however, make selling speed alone much harder to justify. The requirement to check that the payee’s name matches their account identifier also strengthens the common security baseline. Differentiation must therefore move towards how payments are used, rather than remain focused on moving money.
Merchants buy payment acceptance, not payment rails
Take a car repair shop. A customer pays a substantial bill before driving away. An instant transfer can avoid the wait for funds to be credited later, but the repairer does not want to inspect a screenshot displayed on a phone. They want reliable confirmation, linked to their invoice, in their own software. The distinction is essential: evidence displayed by the payer is not confirmation of receipt received by the payee.
This is where services can take shape: a payment link sent with a quote, a QR code at the checkout, transfer initiation through a secure banking process, automatic matching with the order. The building blocks already exist, thanks in particular to open banking and banking application programming interfaces. How they are assembled remains crucial. A solution that looks attractive in a demonstration loses its appeal if the customer has to copy a reference or the accountant has to track down every payment manually.
The competitive landscape therefore extends far beyond the banking app. Providers of point-of-sale, invoicing and business management software have an advantage: they are already part of merchants’ daily routines. Banks and fintechs have good reason to partner with them. The winner may be less the provider whose brand appears at checkout than the one that makes the transaction invisible in administrative workflows.
An alternative to cards still under construction
The economic argument seems obvious: an account-to-account payment can bypass part of the card payment chain. But a potentially cheaper payment rail does not guarantee a lower final bill. Initiation, security, support, integrations and exception handling all need to be funded. To make a fair comparison, merchants must look at the total cost per successful sale, not just the advertised transaction fee.
Cards also retain advantages: a familiar way to pay, very broad acceptance and dispute mechanisms organised by the networks. A transfer does not automatically offer the same protections or the same recovery options. To win buyers over, a bank payment button must therefore clearly explain what happens in the event of an error, an undelivered product or a refund. A pricing schedule alone cannot establish trust.
Wero, launched in 2024 by the European Payments Initiative, EPI, initially for person-to-person payments, illustrates the ambition to build European account-to-account payment journeys. Its expansion into commerce is a development to watch, without presuming here what its level of adoption will be in September 2026. The challenge goes beyond sovereignty: delivering an experience smooth enough for consumers to genuinely change their habits.
Fraud becomes a matter of seconds
Accelerating payments also reduces the time available to stop a scam. A fake supplier announcing a new IBAN, an impersonated executive demanding urgent payment, a victim manipulated into authorising a transfer themselves: many fraud schemes exploit human trust more than technical weaknesses. Once money has been credited and then moved elsewhere, recovering it can become difficult. Payment recall procedures are no guarantee that funds will be returned.
Payee verification provides a useful barrier against certain errors and substitutions, without certifying the commercial legitimacy of a request. A business can pay the correct account holder for a fictitious service. Value-added services will need to combine behavioural analysis, detection of unusual changes, validation of new payees and clear alerts. For merchants’ outgoing payments, appropriate approval workflows may matter more than an opaque risk score.
The challenge will be to screen payments without blocking legitimate sales. Too many alerts, and merchants revert to their old habits; too few, and losses undermine the economic promise. Contracts will need to specify who intervenes, within what time frame and with what liability when a payment causes a problem. This operational service, available beyond office hours, could become a genuine differentiator.
Cash flow: less spectacular, but lasting value
Having funds immediately available helps businesses pay suppliers, replenish stock or narrow a cash-flow gap. The benefit varies by business, however: a small company under financial pressure may value it highly; a well-funded retailer, less so. And instant payment acceptance does not turn an invoice payable in thirty days into an immediate payment. It speeds up the transfer, not necessarily the decision to pay.
The commercial potential lies in combining balance visibility, invoice reconciliation, forecasts of incoming payments and liquidity alerts. A bank can add financing; a fintech can offer a consolidated view across banks and automation. In both cases, merchants will need to measure tangible gains: administrative time saved, errors avoided, actual availability of funds and ease of refunds.
What next? The most plausible scenario is not the rapid disappearance of cards, but coexistence driven by use cases. Large invoices, deposits and assisted remote sales could provide fertile ground for instant transfers. For September 2026 and beyond, the real question will be less “who transfers fastest?” than “who makes the entire sale safer and simpler?”. Regulation provides the foundation; commercial execution will make the difference.
