Role of the NBRM in the Payment System in the Republic of Macedonia

Development

The National Bank of the Republic of Macedonia permanently develops the Real Time Gross Settlement (MIPS) and other domestic payment systems in cooperation with other banks and the Ministry of Finance. The main objective is to create efficient payment systems, reduced bank exposure to risks originating from the payment transactions and introduction of minimum criteria for the payment transaction.

In that regard, the development role of NBRM in the payment systems consists of monitoring and improving the legal framework, introduction of new standards in the operations, as well as monitoring the development tendencies and enabling their implementation in the payment system in the Republic of Macedonia, in order to get ready for the integration courses in this area.

Standardization of the numbers of the bank accounts 

The main requirement for obtaining efficient and safe functioning of the bank accounts system is to have accurate and uniformed information on the accounts. The Decision on the account structure enables the required uniformity and identification of the account number with the client through the Single Register of the Account Holders on the level of the national economy. However, the National Bank of the Republic of Macedonia shall monitor the trends of harmonization of the bank accounts numbers on the international level.

The European Committee for Banking Standards (ECBS) issued a standard for the harmonization of the structure of the International Bank Account Number – IBAN. IBAN is designed in order to promote the automatic processing of the international payment instructions. The IBAN standard is confirmed in the international payments in regard to the rapidity, quality and expenses. With respect to the international payments, the IBAN standard is based on the number of the national account of the country in question. IBAN consists of the state code, which is an internationally identified sign and the national account number. In this phase of the development of the payment system in the Republic of Macedonia only the national account number exists, thus enabling complete compatibility in the development and possibility for implementing the IBAN standard.