• Ideas Payments

  • Provide Input for EPC/SEPA Remittance (Reference)-Fields

Against many answers in this forum the "Description" field doesn't map to the Sender-Reference of the generated SEPA Credit Transfer.
I guess it's mapped into the Info field.

In P2P that won't make any difference, but especially P2B and P2G there's a legal requirement to provide the correct reference in the correct field, to allow their systems to book the payment to the according account - otherwise it's handled like the payment didn't arrive at all, with all pretty serious negative consequences (late interest, penalty, cancellation of contracts, ...)

In addition to that, I'm astonished how many users did mislead others, which asked especially about the reference field.

The EPC shows the possible fields in detail: https://www.europeanpaymentscouncil.eu/sites/default/files/KB/files/EPC069-12%20v2.1%20Quick%20Response%20Code%20-%20Guidelines%20to%20Enable%20the%20Data%20Capture%20for%20the%20Initiation%20of%20a%20SCT.pdf
2nd and 3rd to last are mutually exclusive, but equally important and users must be able to select which one they'd like to fill and especially able to fill them with the reference numbers they've been given by authorities.

    I do believe you and it would be great to have an "expert mode" to set certain fields to our liking. But I must also add that in years of using a bunq account I never had a single problem with this or a merchant not being able to recognize a payment. That includes P2B and P2G payments which I think most of them use automated systems. Anyway, hi-five for this one!

      Tim changed the title to Provide Input for EPC/SEPA Remittance (Reference)-Fields.

        Even customers at "established" (sparkasse DE) banks will suffer if they mess up the field handling.

        A pretty recent case: https://findok.bmf.gv.at/findok?stammNr=111228
        So if you've got to transfer money to Austrian government agencies (especially courts and the financial administration) the reference field must contain the provided reference, otherwise it's handled as if you haven't paid at all.

          9 days later

          @dmnk#166196 This is a really interesting one! using the link you sent, you mean that when you add a Description to a payment in the app, bunq always sends it as AT-05 Remittance Information (Unstructured) (140 character limit), without the option to instead send it as AT-05 Remittance Information (Structured) (35 character limit) ?. Do you have some ideas for solutions? Maybe we could look at

          • Sending all Descriptions as (Structured) until they get over 35 characters?
          • Give option in the app to send Description this way

          Always interested to hear elegant solutions!

            12 days later

            @David-Lime-Dragon#168285 had to think about this, as a elegant solution isn't that easy ;-)

            In the meantime I've found this topic, which requires the same backend functionality to be up and running: https://together.bunq.com/d/12966-sepa-xml-improvements

            So, my suggestion is (without having access to the beta and the new design language)
            - keep the current type / mapping as default (description -> info)
            - (similar to the currency selection, at the amount input screen), add a blue text, which allows to switch between the mappings.

            I'd choose a popup like at the refill notifications page, which is used to choose the refill method (Sofort / iDEAL / ...)

            Keep the texts really close to the EPC's text, and maybe in a smaller font the next line a description what for this is typically used, the size limitation, as well as allowed characters.

            However, @Jakob-Y 's idea would allow to fill both fields for each transaction, but than you'd have to provide a "first-level" distinction simple / expert, and within the expert one, you'd again have to allow a swap between the structured and the unstructured one, with their different length limits.

              a year later

              Could we not have a collapsible/optional reference field below the description field allowing the user to choose whether it is structured or unstructured remittance information? I think most people should be savvy enough to be able to google which they need, and the default can be like now, with a small info button explaining that the default is sufficient for 99% of cases.

              Also, just my opinion, but "Description" isn't the right word for this field, and it causes unnecessary confusion. I think you would have less confusion if you called it "Reference" like most other international banks. Evidence for my statement: the fact that people keep coming to the forum to check whether description = reference, and who need to double and triple check that it's the case. I bet there's a lot more people that were confused than just the forum posts would imply. At least put an info tooltip or something on it that actually says "This is the reference field (unstructured)" or something.

                9 days later

                👍👍👍

                  2 months later

                  As one of those users who trying to figure out if I can make a payroll tax payment to the Dutch tax authority correctly by including the official "payment reference" provided in the Description field... does anyone definitively know if this works correctly in NL before I have huge tax/legal issues. Thanks!

                    Write a Reply...