Stripe, Adyen and GoCardless all support SEPA Direct Debit, but none of them will collect under the B2B scheme, and Mollie doesn't document it either. That matters more than it sounds. B2B is the version where the payer cannot claw the money back, and if you sell to businesses you have probably been told it exists, that it is safer, and that you should "just switch it on". Through a PSP API, in 2026, you can't.
The guides that rank for "SEPA Direct Debit Core vs B2B" are written for finance teams: Core is for consumers, B2B is for companies, B2B has no refund. That's accurate, and it won't help you write the code that handles an MD06 return seven weeks after you shipped the goods. This guide works from the European Payments Council's 2025 rulebooks and implementation guidelines (in force since 5 October 2025), Regulation (EU) 260/2012 and PSD2, and the current developer docs of four PSPs.
What Is the Difference Between SEPA Direct Debit Core and B2B?
They are two separate EPC schemes with two separate rulebooks. They share the mandate model and the ISO 20022 messages, and the differences sit almost entirely in who can reverse a collection and when.
| SDD Core | SDD B2B | |
|---|---|---|
| Rulebook | EPC016-06, 2025 v1.0 | EPC222-07, 2025 v1.0 |
| Who can be the payer | Consumers and businesses | Non-consumers only |
| Refund of an authorised debit | Yes, 8 weeks, no questions asked | No |
| Refund of an unauthorised debit | 13 months | 13 months, not recoverable from the creditor's PSP |
| Debtor bank checks the mandate | No | Yes, against the debtor's confirmation, every collection |
| Latest presentation | D-1 inter-PSP business day | D-1 inter-PSP business day |
| Return window (debtor PSP) | D+5 inter-PSP business days | D+3 inter-PSP business days |
| PSP API support (Stripe, Adyen, GoCardless) | Yes | No |
Core accepts business accounts too. Stripe's docs spell it out: the Core scheme "supports both business and personal bank accounts". So the choice is never "Core for consumers, B2B for companies". The real choice is whether you can get your business customers to do the extra work B2B requires, and whether your bank will sponsor you for it.
How Long Does a SEPA Direct Debit Take? D-1, D+5 and the 14-Day Window
Read the full article on tomcn.uk →
About the Author
I'm Tom Wang, an AI Developer & Fintech Developer — building AI agents, crypto payment infrastructure, and cross-border payout systems with Rust, Go, and TypeScript. Based in London, UK.
Currently open to new opportunities in fintech, crypto payments, and AI agent engineering.
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