Bulgaria prepares payment systems for joining the Eurozone - transfers in euro speed up

The Bulgarian National Bank, the payment system BISERA, two banks and an electronic money company have joined the Eurosystem's TIPS (Target Instant Payment Settlement) service. This will allow instant payments in euro within ten seconds.

The accession is part of the National Plan for the introduction of the euro in the country. The TIPS service will allow domestic and cross-border customer payments in euros to be carried out 24/7.

TIPS is part of the consolidated platform for TARGET services and ensures access to instant euro payments for all payment service providers in the euro area thst are registered participants in the SCT Inst scheme. Notably, 99% of payments in TIPS are processed in less than 5 seconds.

Efforts will continue in 2025 to onboard more payment service providers from Bulgaria to the TIPS system.

Aslo, the Ministry of Finance is expected to request new convergence reports from Brussels and the European Central Bank by 15 December. It is then expected that Bulharia will have met all the criteria for joining the euro area and, once the reports are out, the coubtry will get a date for the actual adoption of the single European currency.