Český finanční a účetní časopis 2016(1):99-116 | DOI: 10.18267/j.cfuc.470

Account with basic features - risk or benefit?

Otakar Schlossberger

JUDr. Ing. Otakar Schlossberger; Katedra financí, Fakulta ekonomických studií, Vysoká škola finanční a správní, Estonská 500, 101 00 Praha 10; <otakar.schlossberger@vsfs.cz>.

On 23 July 2014, European Parliament and Council Directive 2014/92/EU on the comparability of fees related to payment accounts, payment account switching and access to payment accounts with basic features (hereinafter the "Directive") was published in the Official Journal. The transposition of the Directive into national laws and regulations of member states should result in the improvement of the harmonization of legal environment in the field of retail banking. The main aim of this paper is to characterize the Directive and determine through the methods of deduction and analysis, whether the selected banks in the Czech Republic are already prepared to apply the part of Directive that deals with services related to the management of account with basic features. From the view of the author will be assessed if this will actually result in wider available of the provided payment services in relation to the risks related to this activity with regard to the entities acting as service providers. At the same time, hypothesis expressed by the following statement that will either be confirmed or refuted by the author can also be defined: "The services required by the Directive for accounts with basic features are already provided by selected credit institutions, and the implementation of the Directive in this area will thus be smooth."

Keywords: Payment services; Payment account with basic features; Regulation; Availability; Transparency.

JEL classification: G21, G28

Published: March 1, 2016  Show citation