The rules for accessing this payment facility will change and exclude many people from the system.
Going to a store, choosing a product and leaving having only paid part of the bill, the remainder being spread over the next two or three months is in vogue. 37% of French people have already used it.
If this ease of payment allows consumers to make their purchases without emptying their purse all at once, the rules will tighten in the months to come. And everyone will no longer have access to this process. The European Union has in fact decided to modify the law on the subject in 27 countries, including France. In France, at least two million people should no longer be eligible for payment in installments.
Today, the solvency of consumers who pay 3 times without fees is not checked if the bill is less than €200. Everyone can therefore pay these “small” amounts in installments, regardless of their financial situation. This will no longer be possible in a few months.
Merchants will in fact have an obligation to ensure that the customer is solvent, even for an installment invoice of €200 or less. To do this, they will have access to the Banque de France’s payment incident file, the FICP, to ensure that the customer will be able to pay for the product.
If it turns out that it is registered with the FICP, its request for payment in several installments will, a priori, have a good chance of being refused (out of prudence on the part of the seller), even if the registration on the file does not does not result in an automatic refusal.
A major change since, today, the so-called “split” payment of less than 200 euros does not authorize this consultation. Today, around 2 million people are registered in this incident file and could therefore no longer qualify for payment in installments for small purchases.
Another new feature, and not the least: traders will be required to “document these solvency procedures” provides for the European text. In other words, they will have to report any late payment or non-payment. For the buyer, this means financial penalties and possible filing with the Banque de France.
For the moment, the new law is not yet applied in France. If the European Union has definitively adopted it, French law should come into compliance with EU directives in the coming months. The previous version of the text, currently in force, was validated by the Union in 2008 and transposed into French legislation two years later, in 2010.
