Minister for Finance statement on Access to Cash

The Minister states:

The Finance (Provision of Access to Cash Infrastructure) Act 2025 is the result of a recommendation in the Department of Finance's 2022 Review of Retail Banking. The objectives of the Finance (Provision of Access to Cash Infrastructure) Act 2025 are:

• to ensure sufficient and effective access to cash in the State;

• to put in place a framework to manage future changes to the cash infrastructure in a fair, orderly, equitable, and transparent manner; and

• to bring cash-in-transit providers (CITS) and independent ATM deployers within the regulatory perimeter of the Central Bank of Ireland.

The legislation will do so by allowing the Minister for Finance to prescribe, in regulations, access to cash criteria with regard to December 2022 levels initially, taking account of the exits of Ulster Bank and KBC. The regions used for the criteria will be the eight Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics 3 (NUTS3) regions of Ireland, as defined by Eurostat.

The Act will also require ATM deployers and CIT providers to be registered with the Central Bank of Ireland and provides the Central Bank with regulation-making powers in relation to matters such as reporting requirements, service standards, and other matters such as denomination stocking.

The Finance (Provision of Access to Cash Infrastructure) Bill 2024 was signed into law on 20 May 2025, and work will now begin to commence the legislation. Subsequent to commencement, the process for establishing, in regulations, the access to cash criteria and thresholds for identifying designated entities may begin.

The legislation will be commenced on the 30th of June 2025, and I expect the associated regulations to be completed in Q3 2025.