Millions of leaflets bearing the words “Welcome to Sepa” and “What is Sepa?” have fluttered through the post-boxes of European bank customers in the past few weeks, most probably, binned without a second glance.

The flurry of paperwork was nevertheless a prelude to a far-reaching pan-European banking initiative, launched on Monday. Sepa, a private-sector project developed by European banks, stands for the Single Euro Payments Area.