The Australian payments market needs to reinvent itself quickly because financial institutions have milked the existing infrastructure dry without investing in innovation, the Smart Card Summit was told yesterday.Adrian Cosenza, chief executive of Strategic Payments Services, said that Australia was falling behind the world's best practice and said the bilateral connections were hampering competition and innovation.However this view is not shared by APCA. Cosenza was followed on the stage by Michael Forey, Director Project Management and Operations at the Australian Payments Clearing Association who looked at some of the problems and dangers of migrating to EMV (a security standard for chip-based payment and identity cards)."We don't have to go at the same pace as other countries," said Forey "We can afford to sit back, watch and learn."Forey said that individual institutions would roll out EMV at their own pace although the APCA board is considering taking a more active role in fostering collaboration around EMV."The EMV rollout will have to supplement mag stripe for a long time," said Forey. "This is going to be a lengthy transition, mag stripes will be around for a long time yet."Forey said it was up to individual institutions to set their own timetable. He said an industry-wide initiative would not happen in Australia. However, APCA's board will consider how to foster more collaboration in coming months.The RBA's reform of the Australian payments system will be in place by the end of 2008 according to Michelle Bullock, Head of Payments Policy at the RBA.Bullock told the Smart Card Summit in Sydney yesterday that the reform process "could end up with more regulation, less regulation or just tweaking".Denying that the 2004 reforms to interchange fees had unfairly benefited Amex and Diners Club at the expense of Visa and Mastercard, Bullock said that more competition for American Express might be preferable to extra regulation.