Sweden's Riksbank has reached an agreement with payment market participants to expand the ability to make offline card payments for essential goods during serious disruptions to digital communications, with the measures targeted to be in place no later than 1 July 2026. The agreed solution is based on offline authorisation via the physical card’s EMV chip and requires use of the physical card and PIN, meaning it does not work for contactless card payments. The objective is to enable offline purchases of food, pharmacy products and fuel in disruptions lasting up to seven days, at least for individuals over 18 holding cards issued by banks covered by the Riksbank’s contingency regulations. Card networks will adapt their rulebooks to allow merchants to accept offline-authorised transactions up to a per-transaction floor limit at the card issuer’s risk, with a floor limit corresponding to at least SEK 2,000 for outlets selling essential goods based on Merchant Category Codes, and to implement these regulatory changes by 1 February 2026. Card issuers will strive to ensure that cards issued from 1 July 2026 onwards have an accumulated offline limit in the chip at least equivalent to a household’s essential-goods purchases for one week, and to raise limits on existing cards via scripting or replacement where needed. Card acquirers and the retail sector will implement the necessary terminal software and parameters by 1 July 2026, set terminals to attempt online authorisation before allowing offline payments, and ensure merchants can store offline transactions for up to seven days. The Riksbank will continue to lead and coordinate the work and monitor implementation, and will continue work after 1 July 2026 on enabling offline payments for other payment methods.

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