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The European Payments Council (EPC) has published its SEPA Request-To-Pay (SRTP) Inter-Service Provider (SP) API Specifications, completing the technical documentation needed to support the implementation of the SRTP scheme across the Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA).
The release of the v1.0 API specification, aligned with version 4.0 of the SRTP Scheme Rulebook, marks a significant step forward in realising seamless interoperability between SRTP Service Providers (SRTP-SPs).
The EPC first mandated the use of APIs for reachability between SRTP-SPs in November 2023, and the release provides the final piece for full-scale adoption, enabling consistent implementation across Europe’s expanding RTP ecosystem.
The API is designed to facilitate real-time communication between the service providers of the payee and the payer using ISO 20022 messages.
The new standards, effective from October 5, 2025, define five core endpoints for initiating and managing RTP transactions: payment request creation, retrieval, status updates, cancellations, and asynchronous callbacks via URL for delayed responses.
Better, faster communication
The publication of the specifications will deliver clear benefits to banks and payment service providers (PSPs) more broadly, as it allows for consistent and standardised communication between payees and PSPs, even if they operate different internal systems.
It also supports real-time or near-real-time exchanges, enhancing responsiveness and helping firms meet the EPC’s mandatory reachability requirements for SRTP participants.
Although corporates and merchants will not be direct users of the API, they also stand to benefit from the improved reliability and speed of RTP-based services, because the standard supports more predictable and automated payment flows.
These are particularly valuable in invoicing, e-commerce and B2B transactions, and should ultimately enhance the customer experience.
According to the EPC, the SRTP API is tailored for developers, solution architects and system integrators.
It outlines not only the technical message structure and data sets, but also the expected business behaviours and response handling mechanisms.
This release does not address security requirements such as authentication and authorisation, so implementers are expected to refer to the EPC’s separate API Security Framework, which was most recently updated in October 2024.
