American Express (Amex) Australia has confirmed that unless Consumer Data Right (CDR) is expanded to “write-access” under Open Banking in Australia, it would not launch its Amex Pay with Bank Transfer service in Australia.
“Given the challenges with NPP [New Payments Platform] access and lack of ‘write access’ under Australia’s implementation of Open Banking, there is no clear path for Amex to launch this product in Australia,” the company wrote in its submission to the Senate Select Committee on Financial Technology and Regulatory Technology.
Amex Pay with Bank Transfer service allows customers to make payments directly to merchants from their own bank accounts, without the need to be an American Express cardholder. It was launched in the United Kingdom under the country’s implementation of Open Banking in the last three months of 2019.
However, in its submission, Amex said given that fintech firms only have “read-only” access to transactional data, unlike incumbents that have access to payments infrastructure and capabilities, fintechs would be “hamstrung as their value…
