GSIT - Moyens de paiement

Means of payment

At the end of the 1960s, the truncation of means of payment began with the creation of the direct debit- notably for the payment of electricity bills and income tax -, which was followed by the automated credit transfer and then the bill of exchange. It was then extended to include commercial papers, exchanged over the SIT since 1994, and then all interbank transfers. Physical exchanges of credit transfers ("paper" exchanges) between banks ended in 1998.

The truncation of cheques was carried out in two steps. In 1983, certain banks truncated, in their regions, the exchanges of small amount cheques in the form of Truncated Cheques through the creation of nine CREIC (Regional Truncated Cheque Exchange Centres). At the start of 2002, the Banking profession then generalized the exchange of cheques by implementing the Truncated cheque exchange (EIC).

These reforms, decided upon and implemented under the aegis of inter-banking organisations such as the CFONB (Standing Committee on Bank Organisation), the GSIT and the Groupement des Cartes Bancaires (Bank Card Consortium), were made possible by the efficiency of the cooperation between the banks.

The organization of the French payment system demonstrates the strong interbancarity culture that prevails in France, and is based on several principles:

Broad technical cooperation, ranging from the standardization of exchanges to their automation, without calling into question the notion of competition between establishments,
The pooling of investments
Electronic payments require secure treatment processes. Pooling the means on the interbank level serves to lower the costs for exchanging and processing means of payment, through economies of scale,
A high level of security and operational dependability
The administration of means of payment is an exacting activity that requires the implementation of powerful and high-performance protective means and reliability.

This interbancarity allows the GSIT to provide banks and their customers with a very high level of service.