Mastercard will enforce new technical requirements across Europe starting in early 2027 to ensure payments can proceed during telecommunications or electricity outages.
The measure follows an April 2025 blackout across Spain and Portugal, which left an estimated 55 million people unable to process digital transactions.
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Beginning in February 2027, every newly issued Mastercard card in the region must carry offline functionality.
Hardware updates will follow in May 2027, from which point all newly installed and replacement point-of-sale terminals will be required to accept offline transactions.
According to the company, the changes will allow customers to complete chip-and-PIN purchases during blackouts for essential goods at supermarkets, grocery shops, service stations, and pharmacies, as well as at transit and ticket machines.
The mechanism operates by “securely storing” designated transaction caps directly on the card’s microchip.
If a terminal loses network access, it can approve purchases locally up to a ceiling of €200 ($224.64) per transaction, determined beforehand by the cardholder’s bank.
The transaction records are subsequently forwarded for clearing once terminal connectivity is restored.
Mastercard has already “successfully” deployed the offline system in Denmark, Sweden, Estonia, and Latvia.
The wider European rollout follows discussions with industry partners, central banks, financial regulators, and national governments.
Mastercard executive vice president of core payments Brice van de Walle said: “When the power or network goes down, people still need to buy food, fuel and medicine.
“We’ve seen that offline payments can make a real difference. By expanding this technology across Europe, we can help people keep paying for the things they need, even when the unexpected happens.”
