Last week eBay Inc. Federal Govt. Relations representative Ali Gabel attended the 37th annual NACHA Conference in San Diego. The three day conference focused on the future of electronic payments and offered the opportunity to reach a wide audience of financial institutions, corporate, government and electronic technology provider decision-makers. Gabel was able to give a presentation at the “Focus on Washington Session”, which focused on the need to eliminate redundant and burdensome screening requirements when processing cross-border payments.
NACHA, the Electronic Payments Association, manages the governance of the ACH Network, the backbone for the electronic movement of money and data. The eBay team specifically presented on international ACH transactions and ways to provide regulatory or legislative relief to industry. Based on the positive feedback, eBay believes, working with industry, it can begin laying the groundwork to drive meaningful reform in Congress, with draft legislative language emerging that potentially could be included in a technical corrections bill moving in Congress. The draft legislative language would eliminate burdensome screening requirements for smaller financial institutions. Such legislative action, if successful, could be a “win-win” for industry — helping smaller financial institutions by reducing redundant screening burdens and helping PayPal preserve a positive, frictionless cross-border payments experience for our customers.