Archive note: This text comes from the old archive of Nomika Epilekta and is preserved with care for historical and informational reading.

One of the most important innovations of our time is electronic commerce (e-commerce), a modern form of market activity that has expanded across the entire planet thanks to the internet (internet) and to the endless possibilities of communication that it provides to everyone without exception. Through e-commerce, all kinds of transactions are carried out between users by electronic means, through the internet, to whose progress this form of commerce owes its existence and its continuous rapid expansion. Through this kind of trading, electronic products (goods), every kind of service and information are offered for sale and purchase without the drafting of any document, only through the use of electronic computers. With the operation of e-commerce, distances are reduced to zero and the movement of the items sold and purchased is facilitated, whether these are goods, or services, information, education and every other kind of value that can become the object of supply and demand, for economic consideration. The most extensive form of e-commerce is that conducted between the commercial enterprise and its consumers - customers, who have easy, direct, absolutely secure and comfortable access to all the products of the enterprise - electronic store (e-shop). By this method of “distance trading”, prospective buyers are given the possibilities of: full information regarding the items sold, examination of the items as if they had them in front of them, selection of whichever of them they desire or, even, trial of clothing items, comparison of price levels and finally purchase, by concluding a distance contract, effortlessly, very quickly and safely, without leaving their homes, depending on the organization of the enterprise and the programs used by it. Enterprises, through this method of modern electronic communication, sale and transaction, operate more effectively, offer better products, prove consistent and rationalize selling prices, because of the immediacy of communication with consumers and the desire to maintain the reputation of the commercial store at high levels of esteem and prestige, so as to gather the preferences of buyers and prevail in the competitive environment of the market. Through the electronic payment carried out, commercial enterprises and, more specifically, commercial stores (e-shops) collect money immediately, limit cases of error and reduce the cost of transactions. As electronic enterprises expand, that is, enterprises that operate and transact by electronic means, and as electronic stores expand, the globalization of commerce intensifies, and certainly the future belongs to digital enterprises, which do not manage goods so much as the information relating to them, for the better briefing and service of the customer through the very rapid provision to him of the required services for the immediate satisfaction of his purchasing requests and consumer demands at lower cost. Electronic transactions are considered, and are, confidential and secure both for merchants and for customers, compared with traditional methods of carrying out commercial transactions, through the use of numerous effective and advanced security systems, which use methods of encryption and secret codes, with the encoding of the information transmitted, of which only the authorized user of the decryption key can become aware. The various effective security systems may be accompanied by the widely used digital signature, through which the identity of the contracting parties is certified. For our country, e-commerce could constitute one of the most effective means of exit from the so-called crisis. Through its development, it can decisively strengthen the national economy, because it concerns sales of goods (products) and services to consumers both inside and outside the European Union, in the United States of America (USA), Canada, Australia, Russia, China and all the other states of the world. In this field, however, the state mechanism, with its labyrinthine services, general directorates, secretariats and agencies, must take a serious interest, which it does not possess, in order to facilitate and promote e-commerce. This means that bureaucracy must be reduced immediately and drastically and all economic actors and, more than all, the commercial banks must be obliged to support the operation of e-commerce by abolishing all existing obstacles, and in particular they must be compelled to encourage, frame and support the establishment of electronic stores, facilitating existing ones, ceasing to obstruct systematically the opening of accounts, as happens now, for online payments, with the use of credit cards and with the other suitable methods of payment (such as, for example, through the crediting and corresponding debiting of bank accounts). In Greece, e-commerce, the electronic store and electronic business activity are not only not supported by banking companies, but on the contrary are obstructed by them on every occasion. This is due, to mention only the obvious reasons, to the ignorance and idleness of the competent employees, to the complete indifference of the administrations of the commercial banks as well as of the Bank of Greece, to contempt for the economically active citizen, because of the third-world obsessions prevailing in our country about economic phenomena, and to the desire, according to a plan, to destroy the national economy completely, with the disastrous and willing collaboration of the company recording the economic beliefs of citizens “Tiresias S.A.” [Nomika Epilekta: “Tiresias” and “Tiresias in installments”]. Consequently, if a Greek enterprise, among the few that produce original products, wishes to approach the millions of internet users - its potential customers, confidently expecting great economic development, revenue and profits, by expanding its electronic store into any other country, outside Greece, in the international electronic environment, it will encounter insurmountable obstacles, because of which its business initiative, its strategy of internationalization, will be suspended, and its certain economic flourishing will be frustrated. One of the many problems faced by e-commerce and the operation of an electronic store through the internet is that, apart from one and only one bank (which, with the unpunished arrogance of its employees, also obstructs and frustrates every economic effort), the entirety of Greek banks does not support e-commerce and does not provide enterprises with the ability to make payments and collections online by opening the accounts required. The banks do provide, however, the usual unfulfilled promises that soon, at some future and indefinite time, they will open departments supporting e-commerce. To the questions why the banks do not support electronic business activity and for what reason this paradox occurs in our country, which has an immediate need for revenue and expansion of economic activity, through the encouragement of private initiative in this highly profitable field, the competent persons do not answer. You see, through the strengthening of e-commerce, those who have the power to facilitate, by fulfilling their official duties, do not expect kickbacks and, for that reason, have no incentive to take an interest. Besides, everyone’s positions and salaries, cut or whole, are secured, in contrast with enterprises and those active in the field of the private economy, who face business risks and the future as prepared by the incapable persons who hold powers and competences of every kind. It should be noted that, for the support of e-commerce and, more specifically, of the electronic store (e-shop), entrepreneurs (electronic merchants) do not ask for financial aid and loans from the “Greek” banks, but only for the opening of the accounts required in order to collect from other countries the sums of money that come from sales of products. The state mechanism and the banks, the one that has an e-commerce sector and all the others that do not, do not allow this money to flow into Greece, without there being any reason beyond the arrogance and arbitrariness of all those who have settled on the shoulders of the people and refuse to leave.