German direct debit and girocard

Introduction

girocards are German Debit Card products developed by the German Banking Industry Committee that allow multiple methods of payments. It's up to terminal what payment it wants to perform.

  1. girocard scheme by using chip and Pin (guaranteed by girocard scheme)
    In payment request use 'G' for CardBrndmer
  2. Co-branded (primarily with Maestro or VPay) scheme by using chip/magstripe and pin/signature (guaranteed by credit card scheme)
  3. Direct debit transaction (in German: Elektronische Lastschrift or ELV)
    In payment request use 'E' for CardBrnd

Increase of trace number

girocard as well as ELV transactions can only be processed from the Gateway through our German authorisation host called Poseidon. For successful transaction processing the TxRef has to increment the counter by 10.
For more information please see https://docs.fiserv.dev/public/docs/additional-requirements

girocard transactions

girocard transactions can be processed online or offline depending on terminal floor limit.

Girocard instrument that is read as contactless EMV could be processed as:

  • Girocard Online with No CVM
  • Girocard Online with Online PIN

Emergency processing

Girocard allows Emergency processing according to nexo IS 4.0 specifications. Emergency is a special type of fallback processing indicated in nexo Acquirer message as Cntxt/PmtCntxt/FllbckInd with values "FFLB" or "SFLB" and the ICCRltdData elements according to TA (technicla annex) 7.2 und DC POS 3.x by the Deutsche Kreditwirtschaft.


Direct debit transactions

The credit default risk is on the merchant.
Therefore, Fiserv offers additional services such as:

  • TSD (=Terminal-Sperr-Datei): In case TSD check is enabled, the transaction will be verified against a Fiserv internal fraud database (of blacklisted cards). This will reduce the overall risk of chargebacks.
  • TSD+ (=Terminal-Sperr-Datei Plus): If the TSD check fails, then the online ELV payment will be rejected with response code '62'. At the same time the gateway will include the field TxRspn/Actn/ActnTp value "FLFW" (Fall Forward) in the nexo Acquirer response message requesting the terminal to retry the the terminal should retry the transaction as girocard online transaction.
  • GLV (=Garantierte Lastschrift or guaranteed direct debit): In case GLV is enabled, Fiserv will refund the merchant in case of bounced direct debits.

There is no differentiation for these additional services in the communication between terminal (host) and the Gateway. All of them are initiated as direct debit transactions.

Nexo terminals should only allow ELV processing with CardDataNtryMd as 'CICC'. When the card is read using the contactless interface, the instrument type will always be considered as girocard.

Depending on terminal specific limits, host response codes and your override decision, a girocard instrument that is read using the contact EMV interface could be processed as:

ELV Offline - approved by terminal and sent as AcceptorCompletionAdvice to the Gateway after the signature was verified. TxVrfctnRslt must be 'PPSG' or 'CPSG'.

ELV Online - sent as AcceptorAuthorisationRequest to the Gateway before signature was verified. TxVrfctnRslt must be 'PPSG' or 'CPSG'. The TX will be approved or decline by Fiserv based on TSD check.

The Gateway is not explicitely rejecting other values but the transaction might be declined by the respective authorization system or the issuer.

ELV payments require the printing of the International Bank Account Number (IBAN) on the receipt. If present in the authorization response, the Gateway will populate the IBAN in ICCRltdData in EMV tag 5F53 of the response message.


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