The financial institutions across the euro area all handle domestic retail payments and cross-border retail payments differently. Service differs too, with cross-border payments generally taking longer to process, historically being more expensive, and requiring greater involvement by the end customer. The Single Euro Payments Area (SEPA) project seeks to fix all this. This TowerGroup Research Note elaborates on the SEPA vision by analyzing the progress toward SEPA in each major payment instrument and providing a view of the road ahead.