Instant and free money transfers are coming to bank customers in Spain this month

Most Spanish financial institutions will eliminate the commission fees with the entry into force of a European directive

Almudena Nogues

Malaga

Friday, 3 January 2025, 16:01

Sending money instantly will be free in a matter of days for almost all customers with a bank account in Spain. Most Spanish banks will eliminate fees from 9 January with the entry into force of a European directive. In February 2024 the European Parliament approved a regulation that obliges all European banks to offer instant money transfers to their customers at a price that is equal to or lower than that of normal transfers. Given that in Spain ordinary transfers are already free at most banks, then instant transfers will also be free this year.

The service is available 24 hours a day, seven days a week and the maximum amount that can be transferred is 100,000 euros. Transfers can be made between individuals, from individuals to companies and from companies to companies. At present, there are two types of bank transfer in the European Union. On the one hand, the traditional bank transfer that must be credited to the beneficiary's account no later than the end of the working day following the day on which the order was placed. The second is the instant transfer that allows money to be sent within 20 seconds, any day of the year and at any time, including public holidays.

Despite the speed offered by this type of operation, their use has been limited due to the high fees that many institutions have been charging. In fact, Spain's OCU independent consumer organisation has complained that few customers use them due to their cost, among other reasons. The OCU provides an example: "Bankinter charges 0.4% of the amount with a minimum of 12 euros and Caixabank asks for a fixed fee of 1.99 euros plus 0.4% of the amount transferred, with a minimum of 3.95 euros."

One of the objectives of this measure is to boost online payments. Spain is one of the European countries where they have increased the most. In 2023, 54% of transactions were instant transfers, and this is increasing every year, according to data from Iberpay, the company that manages the national payments system. Yet in the rest of Europe they are not as common and prices are higher. According to the European Commission, one in three banks in the EU does not offer instant transfers to its customers, and there are still 70 million accounts where this option is not available.

More security

In addition to the changes in fees, the new European regulation introduces an improvement in the security of such transfers. Until now, banks only verified the IBAN of the recipient, without checking whether it matched the name of the account holder, which left users unprotected against errors or fraud.

Under the new regulation, banks will be obliged to offer a service to verify whether the name and IBAN match. In case of a discrepancy, the bank will notify the user before executing the transfer, significantly reducing the risk of mistakes, fraud or scams.

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