The Bank of Spain reports that during the first half of 2024, card readers in Spanish businesses received 18% more contactless transactions than during the same period in 2023. That means that in one year, the total grew from 3.613 billion to 4.264 billion. Although Spain is a country where physical currency is still commonly used—57% of Spanish customers say they use cash daily—an increasing number of people prefer to pay with alternative options. Businesses of all types are introducing devices to process in-person card payments.

Many attribute this growth to the supposed fact that having a card reader is mandatory for businesses in Spain, but is there really a law that requires this? Or is it simply a trend that most are following? Below, we will try to provide a definitive answer to these questions.

What’s in this article?

• Are businesses in Spain required to have a card reader?
  
• Is it recommended to have a card reader in a business in Spain?
  
• Recommendations when selecting a card reader
  
• How Stripe Terminal can help
  
• FAQs about the requirement to have a card reader in a business in Spain
  

Are businesses in Spain required to have a card reader?

While measures in recent years encourage domestic businesses to use terminals, there is currently no statute making it mandatory to take payments with methods besides cash. The European Commission’s retail strategy communication explicitly urges digital acceptance. Regardless, the only obligation on acceptance comes from the Bank of Spain, which prohibits refusing cash tenders.

In short, the rise of card readers in shops around the country is mainly because a growing share of customers prefer to pay with alternative options to banknotes. In fact, between the first half of 2023 and the first half of 2024, noncash transactions increased by 11.4%, per data from the Bank of Spain. In addition, for companies with a high average order value (AOV), allowing other methods of pay is important for purchases that exceed the €1,000 limit on cash established by the anti-fraud law.

Legislation strictly prohibits circumventing this limit by splitting the amount among multiple forms of payment. Transactions of €1,000 or more (or the equivalent in other currencies) must be completed through digital payment systems. Paying the full amount or any portion in cash is illegal.

Is it recommended to have a card reader in a business in Spain?

While we have already seen that there is no law requiring a payment terminal in a shop in Spain, we strongly suggest adding a card reader to your point of sale (POS). Let’s take a look at some of the main advantages:

• Compatible with popular payment methods
  Although it depends on each model, card readers are generally compatible with most in-person payment options, for instance credit cards, digital wallets, and Bizum. Accepting the range of payment methods trusted by customers means that business revenue grows.

• Reduces manual errors
  When we reduce the volume of purchases paid in notes, fewer manual errors are made when giving change to buyers or properly recording sales.

• Simplifies checkout
  Businesses spend less time on tasks such as calculating the cash to be returned to patrons and verifying the authenticity of bills, so the checkout is completed faster.

• Improves accounting and tax management
  Manual errors cause discrepancies and complicate accounting controls. Card readers can record information automatically and accurately, supporting compliance with tax obligations such as filing the quarterly value-added tax (VAT) return (Form 303).

• Modernizes your brand image
  Since it is not required to install a terminal at a bar or restaurant in Spain, some of these businesses and small traditional stores still prefer cash transactions. However, according to the Bank of Spain, acceptance of payments via mobile devices is growing at stores and venues in the hospitality industry, because they know that this modernizes their brand image. With the help of card readers such as those launched by BBVA, it is possible to receive Bizum transactions at brick-and-mortar locations, since they support contactless payments without any need for links or QR codes.

Recommendations when selecting a card reader

As we noted, a card reader plays a key role for businesses in Spain. Here is a list of tips for selecting the right one for your venture:

• Compliance with legal requirements
  The terminal must be approved and meet legal requirements such as those laid out in Royal Decree-Law 19/2018, on payment services, and the Law on Information Society Services and Electronic Commerce (LSSI). Additionally, it must meet security standards, e.g., the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard (PCI DSS).

• Bank-independent card readers
  Although banks are very transparent about fees and commissions, they often involve contracting adjacent services. If you want to avoid this, opt for bankless card readers, which do not entail any kind of contractual agreement with a financial institution.

• Integration of in-person and online sales
  Suppose your business operates in both a physical location and online. In that case, it's key to choose a POS that allows you to manage your in-person and online sales with a single platform to provide a unified commerce experience.

• Payment methods
  Terminals need to support the options preferred by Spanish customers. Over half of Spaniards under 35 no longer consider cash to be their preferred method, and nearly 10% cite mobile apps as their top choice.

How Stripe Terminal can help

Stripe Terminal allows businesses to grow revenue with unified payments across in-person and online channels. It supports new ways to pay, simple hardware logistics, global coverage, and hundreds of POS and commerce integrations to design your ideal payments stack.

Stripe powers unified commerce for brands like Hertz, URBN, Lands’ End, Shopify, Lightspeed, and Mindbody.

Stripe Terminal can help you:

• Unify commerce: Manage online and in-person payments on a global platform with unified payments data.
  
• Expand globally: Scale to 24 countries with a single set of integrations and popular payment methods.
  
• Integrate your way: Develop your own custom POS app or connect with your existing tech stack using third-party POS and commerce integrations.
  
• Simplify hardware logistics: Easily order, manage, and monitor Stripe-supported readers, wherever they are.
  

Learn more about Stripe Terminal, or get started today.

FAQs about the requirements to have a card reader in a business in Spain

Is it required to have a card reader in a business in Spain that states that it accepts cards?

If the business states that it accepts card payments, it is obliged to have a card reader to receive them. According to FACUA-Consumers in Action, this obligation applies when the device is out of order. In that case, the business needs to explicitly inform its customers, before they make their purchase, that it is temporarily unable to accept cards.

Are businesses in the EU required to have a card reader?

No European law establishes this obligation; each country sets its own rules. For example, establishments in Spain or Portugal do not need to provide electronic terminals. On the other hand, in Italy, Greece, and Romania, businesses must have a card reader or a comparable system that supports cashless payments.

What happens if a store refuses to accept a card payment?

No law in Spain requires businesses to accept card payments, so refusing this method is not subject to any legal penalties.

However, if a store explicitly mentions that they accept cards (e.g., through a visible sign, either inside the establishment or on their website) and then refuses to process the transaction, it can cause bad customer experiences and negatively impact their reputation. As stated by FACUA-Consumers in Action, in these cases, the company should offer the shopper an alternative payment option (e.g., a bank account number to make a SEPA transfer or a phone number to send the amount via Bizum), rather than requiring cash.

In addition, based on data from the Bank of Spain, the share of Spaniards who report not carrying a single banknote in their wallet regularly doubled between 2023 and 2024 (from 2% to 4% of survey participants). This means that refusing card payments immediately reduces your business’s potential customer base.