Tag: upi

PhonePe Launches Feature to Pay Income Tax Through Its App

Digital payments and fintech platform PhonePe on Monday launched a feature to pay income tax through its app. 

Individuals and businesses can pay self-assessment and advance tax through UPI or credit card via the application, without logging into the income tax portal, PhonePe said.

The amount will be credited to the tax portal within two working days.

Users can pay taxes by logging into the app and selecting the “income tax” icon. Then, they must select the type of tax to be paid, assessment year and Permanent Account Number (PAN) details. After entering the total tax amount, users will be able to pay using the chosen mode of payment.

Taxpayers will receive a Unique Transaction Reference (UTR) number as an acknowledgement within one working day after paying the tax while challan for the payment will be available within two working days, it added.

Niharika Saigal, Head of Bill Payments and Recharge Business at PhonePe said, “Paying taxes can often be a complex and time-consuming task, and PhonePe is now offering its users a hassle-free and secure way to fulfill their tax obligations…this will transform the way our users pay taxes as we have now made the process both simple and easy.” PhonePe has partnered with digital B2B payments service provider PayMate for enabling the feature.

Started in 2015, the Walmart subsidiary was recently separated from its e-commerce sibling Flipkart. PhonePe has about 50 crore registered users and processes 45 per cent of transactions on Bharat Bill Pay System (BBPS). The company became a fintech in 2017 and launched mutual funds and insurance products. 

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Zomato Temporarily Halts New Users on Its UPI Platform to Incorporate Feedback

Food delivery platform Zomato on Thursday said it has temporarily paused the onboarding of new users on the Unified Payments Interface it rolled out in May to incorporate feedback. 

The company said it will start enrolling new users on the app by the end of the month.

In May this year, the Gurugram-based firm launched Unified Payments Interface (UPI) services for some users in the country in partnership with ICICI Bank.

“The UPI offering has been temporarily paused for new user onboarding, only to incorporate feedback received on the onboarding flow. We will start enrolling new users by the end of the month,” a Zomato spokesperson said.

UPI is a real-time payment system developed by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).

The service facilitates transfer of money directly from the user’s phones using a UPI PIN on supporting apps. Some of the top players offering UPI service in the country are Google Pay, Paytm and PhonePe. 

Zomato launched its own Zomato UPI service in partnership with ICICI Bank, all ready to take on Google Pay and PhonePe, in May this year. The aim was to make online payments more seamless with Zomato UPI by giving users an option of using the facility without doing KYC.

To use the Zomato UPI, users need to create their UPI ID on the Zomato app. “UPI Facility offers an instant, 24X7, interbank electronic fund transfer or fund collection service to the Users of UPI member banks. ICICI Bank will provide a mobile application to the Users which will use the NPCI UPI libraries facilitating payments,” said Zomato in a release at the time. 

From the Nothing Phone 2 to the Motorola Razr 40 Ultra, several new smartphones are expected to make their debut in July. We discuss all of the most exciting smartphones coming this month and more on the latest episode of Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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DMRC Launches Online App for Generating Mobile QR Tickets

The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) on Friday launched a dedicated mobile app for its passengers with the name ‘DMRC TRAVEL’ for generating convenient and hassle-free mobile QR tickets for travelling across its network.

The app was formally launched today by Dr Vikas Kumar, Managing Director, DMRC from the headquarters at Metro Bhawan in the presence of senior officials.

With this new mobile App, passengers can now purchase tickets directly from their smartphones, eliminating the need to go to ticket counters/vending machines or stand in queues.

The passengers can now experience a quick and efficient ticketing process, saving valuable time during their commute.

The app supports a variety of payment methods, including UPI, credit/debit cards, and wallets, ensuring flexibility and convenience for users. Passengers can choose their preferred payment option and easily complete the transaction within the app itself.

In addition, this app also has other passenger-centric features like a travel planner, fare calculator, station information, and smart card recharge. The app also shows route information from origin to destination including interchange stations. One can view transaction history, and rebook tickets for the same origin-destination and return journey.

The ‘DMRC TRAVEL’ App will be available for download on the android platform which will be followed by the iOS platform soon, allowing a wide range of users to experience the convenience of mobile QR ticketing.

Passengers are encouraged to download the app from their respective app stores and explore the features and benefits it offers.

In order to provide such a user-friendly, cashless and fast mode of ticketing, DMRC carried out a mammoth technically challenging exercise of upgrading its AFC Gates, which were already in passenger services, on all its corridors without shutting down these gates even for a single day in record time.

The entire exercise was taken up mostly during the limited time available in the night once the passenger services were over, in a manner that once the services resumed the next day, all the gates were again kept functional for passengers. DMRC has already upgraded over 60 percent of its AFC gates with QR code scanners and the remaining are also targeted to be covered within the next 1-2 months.

With the introduction of the ‘DMRC TRAVEL’ App, DMRC aims to enhance the overall commuting experience of passengers by providing a modern and user-friendly ticketing solution. This initiative aligns with DMRC’s commitment to leveraging technology for the comfortable commute of its valued passengers.

After the successful payment, the app will generate a mobile QR ticket. Present this QR ticket at the AFC (Automatic Fare Collection) gate for entry and exit during your journey.

The app also provides an option to view the purchased tickets in the “view transaction” menu, allowing you to access and manage your tickets as needed.

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Paytm Signs MoU With Arunachal Pradesh to Create Startup Ecosystem

Paytm Payment Services Limited (PPSL) on Thursday signed an MoU with ArunachalPradesh Innovation and Investment Park (APIIP) to create a startup ecosystem for the youth in the northeastern state, officials said. 

According to the MoU, Paytm Incubation Centre will provide its product to early-stage startups at a discounted price and offer free credits through the Paytm Startup toolkit to aid the business ventures of youths in their early stage of growth.

This will nurture the startup ecosystem in the state and motivate the young entrepreneurs, an official communiqué informed here.

The MoU was signed at the Arunachal Pradesh Innovation and Investment Park, the first state-owned marquee incubator here in the presence of its CEO Tabe Haidar.

“We are happy to partner with the government of Arunachal Pradesh in its journey to create a vibrant startup ecosystem. At the Paytm Incubation Centre, we strive to catalyse the startup ecosystem in India and help young entrepreneurs gain new user acquisition, access funds and more facilities,” the spokesperson of Paytm Payment Services said.

“Our comprehensive platform helps businesses to expand their digital presence with quick integration of payment, brand and commerce solutions,” he added.

Paytm is India’s payment app, which offers consumers and merchants payment services. It is a pioneer of mobile QR payments in the country.

It enables commerce for small merchants and distributes various financial services offerings to its consumers and merchants in partnership with financial institutions, the communiqué added.

Last month, payments and financial services company Paytm partnered with SBI Card to launch Paytm SBI Card on the RuPay network.

The Motorola Edge 40 recently made its debut in the country as the successor to the Edge 30 that was launched last year. Should you buy this phone instead of the Nothing Phone 1 or the Realme Pro+? We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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India, New Zealand to Increase Cooperation for Facilitation of UPI System

India and New Zealand on Thursday decided to increase cooperation in areas such as facilitation of UPI system, timely resolution of trade issues, work visa, and improving the banking relations.

Looking at the present quantum of bilateral trade between the two countries, both sides acknowledged the huge potential and the need for bringing in synergy for enhanced economic relations in areas of mutual interest.

These issues were discussed during a joint meeting between India and New Zealand with the industry and industry associations of both the countries here.

The discussions also focused on taking forward the objectives of the Joint Trade Committee (JTC), formed under the Bilateral Trade Agreement of 1986.

The meeting was co-chaired by the Additional Secretary, Department of Commerce, Rajesh Agarwal, and High Commissioner of New Zealand in India David Pine.

The additional secretary “appreciated the positivity in discussion leading to tentative identification of various areas of cooperation including the facilitation of UPI system, carbon credit, package proposal on Kiwi fruits, trans-shipment hub, prioritization of bilateral trade issues for their timely resolution, collaboration on technology issues, cooperation in services such as work visa related issues, improving the banking relations further,” the commerce ministry said.

It said that some of the areas explored by the New Zealand High Commissioner included promotion of Unified Payment Interface (UPI) system, carbon credit co-operation, and working together on specific issues like the comprehensive proposal made by Zespri and prioritization of requests on non-tariff measures for bilateral gains.

He also emphasized on increasing the air connectivity links between the countries.

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Existing UPI QR Codes Could Begin Processing Transactions in eRupee CBDC: RBI’s T Rabi Sankar

India is planning to introducing its own blockchain-based eRupee CBDC for commercial use. The country is mulling more ways to make this process simple for adoption. On Thursday, May 8, RBI Deputy Governor T Rabi Sankar hinted that existing UPI QR codes could become interoperable with the Indian CBDC in the months to come. At this point, the RBI is considering if existing QR codes must act like a gateway for CBDC transactions. It, however, remains unclear by when would the RBI take a concrete decision on the subject.

Sankar was addressing a press conference on Thursday when he announced this update to the media.

“We are planning to make the UPI QR code interoperable [with the eRupee],” media reports quoted Sankar as saying.

Given that the UPI QR codes reportedly help over 300 million Indians facilitate online payments, their use for CBDC payments could aid more people adopt the payment means.

CBDC — central bank digital currency — is the virtual representation of a fiat currency on a blockchain network. Similar to cryptocurrency in functionality but controlled by central banks, CBDCs are capable of storing permanent transactional records on the blockchain, while also reducing the national dependency on cash notes.

India, at present, is on an advanced stage of trials for its eRupee CBDC.

Currently, eRupee worth over Rs. 130 crore are in circulation as part of the going trials. The detail was revealed by Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman earlier in March.

Over 50,000 testers, 5,000 selected merchants and multiple banks are involved in the trial runs of the eRupee CBDC, which is being accepted at select Reliance stores in Mumbai.

India and UAE have also joined forces in agreeing to take the trials of their respective CBDCs to a cross-country level. The central banks of both the nations will collectively be testing how their CBDCs operate from the other country.

By the end of June, India aims to onboard a million users to its CBDC ecosystem, Sankar reportedly said in today’s press conference.

As of now, the government has not disclosed any special date on which this digital currency would be rolled out to the masses for daily use.

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Google Pay Rolls Out UPI Payments Support for RuPay Card Holders of These Banks: Details

Tapping into the growing popularity of Unified Payments Interface (UPI), Google Pay in conjunction with the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) on Tuesday announced the capability for users to make UPI payments with RuPay credit cards. 

With this development, users can link their RuPay credit cards with Google Pay to seamlessly pay at all online and offline merchants where RuPay credit cards are accepted.  

This feature is now available to RuPay credit card holders of Axis Bank, Bank of Baroda, Canara Bank, HDFC bank, Indian Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Punjab National Bank and Union Bank of India. More banks will follow suit shortly. 

To activate, users need to add the RuPay credit card to Google Pay. Users can tap on the “RuPay credit card on UPI” option in their profile and select the bank which issued their RuPay credit card. 

Thereafter, users will need to set a unique UPI PIN by entering the last six digits of the card number and expiry, and then entering the OTP from their bank. The statement from Google said users are ready to pay merchants on UPI with their RuPay credit card. “They will enter the set UPI PIN, the same way they do for other UPI transactions,” it added. 

Sharath Bulusu, Director of Product Management from Google, said, “Google Pay is a partner to India’s financial ecosystem — enabling millions of users to safely and conveniently make digital payments every day… This feature will give Google Pay users more flexibility and choice in making payments, and will drive greater adoption of digital payments in the country.” 

Nalin Bansal, Chief Relationship Management and Key Initiatives, Corporate Business from NPCI, said, “The integration of RuPay Credit Card on UPI delivers a remarkable user experience seamlessly combining the convenience of UPI with the benefits of RuPay Credit Card.” 

Bansal said, “We believe this service will mature to provide access to digital credit on demand and consumers will be able to make payments by taking benefit of the inherent security and availability of UPI network across both offline and online platforms.”  

In recent years, India has witnessed a huge rise in the number of transactions made through UPI. NPCI reported a massive jump in monthly transaction count as the UPI transactions touched 8.7 billion in March 2023. To further bolster growth of digital payments in the country, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) allowed linking of RuPay credit cards to the UPI platform in June 2022. 

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Japan Explores Ways to Join India’s UPI Payment System

Japan is mulling to join India’s UPI payment system and promote cooperation on the digital identity system, an official statement said on Friday.

Bhutan, Nepal, Singapore and UAE have already started accepting Unified Payment Interface (UPI) payment systems.

“Almost every global forum, whether G20, SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation) or G7, wherever we are presenting Hon’ble PM Modi’s Digital India vision, has very good traction.

“People understand how Modi ji has democratised digital technology. I thank the Japanese digital minister. He has accepted PM Modi’s very deep and extensive vision of Digital India,” Union Minister for IT and Telecom Ashwini Vaishnaw said.

Japanese Digital Minister Kono Taro earlier on Friday said in an interview with a media channel that Japan is mulling joining India’s UPI system and working on mutually recognising digital identities as well.

“We just had our G7 Digital Ministers’ meeting last month and we had our Indian Digital Minister Mr Vaishnaw join with us and right now. Japan and India are trying to promote digital cooperation.”

“We are now seriously thinking about joining Indian UPI, the payments system and also, we are contemplating how we can mutually recognise e-ID, for well – starting with cooperation, so we can increase interoperability,” Taro said. 

According to a report published last month, UPI, debit and credit cards, and prepaid payment instruments — Mobile and Prepaid cards —processed 87.92 billion transactions worth Rs. 149.5 trillion during 2022 in India. In terms of UPI, Person-to-Merchant (P2M) and Person-to-Person (P2P) are the most preferred payment modes among consumers with a market share of 40 percent and 44 percent in terms of transactions volume (UPI was 84 percent in total), according to Worldline in its India Digital Payments Annual Report.

Google I/O 2023 saw the search giant repeatedly tell us that it cares about AI, alongside the launch of its first foldable phone and Pixel-branded tablet. This year, the company is going to supercharge its apps, services, and Android operating system with AI technology. We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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India Being Urged to Restore UPI Access for Users of Crypto Exchanges: Report

India is reportedly reconsidering to let crypto investors use Unified Payments Interface (UPI) to purchase digital assets like cryptocurrencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). The financial authorities of India have received multiple proposals, urging them to allow the integration of UPI for crypto transactions. These proposals have been sent by crypto advocacy group Bharat Web3 Association (BWA). It is notable that this topic is being brought up now at a time when India is heading the formulation of global crypto rules under its ongoing G20 Presidency.

As part of these proposals to the Indian government, the crypto-advocacy group has pointed out that India’s crypto industry is reeling under high tax pressure as an aftermath of last year’s crypto slump. The country’s shadow ban on the sector severed the ties of traditional banks with crypto exchanges, causing inconvenience to the investor community. The development, citing anonymous sources familiar with the matter, was first reported by Coindesk on Wednesday, May 17

The UPI or the United Payments Interface is an instant online payment technology pioneered by India. Overseen by the NPCI, the UPI is an online payments mode in India, with over 300 million Indians reportedly using UPI to instantly transfer money from one account to another via apps such as BharatPe, Paytm, and Google Pay, among others.

In August 2022, when Coinbase announced that it was going to let Indian users purchase crypto on its app via UPI payments, the National Payments Corporations of India (NPCI) said it did not authorise Coinbase to provide this feature.

Amid regularity unclarity, the government of India as well as its central bank have not been very supportive of promoting crypto-related activities in the country.

After NPCI’s statement, Coinbase halted the release of the feature and to date it remains inaccessible to users.

With one tap, the UPI system lets users make instant peer-to-peer payments from banks or digital wallets. The system was introduced in April 2016, months after Prime Minister Narendra Modi demonetised many currency notes in India as part of financial restructuring.

Between then and now, India has very well adopted the UPI payment system with approximately 74 billion UPI transactions worth $1.5 trillion (roughly Rs. 1,23,56,962 crore) conducted in 2022 alone, as per Worldline’s report, India Digital Payments Annual Report for 2022

Indian authorities are hence exercising caution before allwoing UPI usage for crypto purchases, especially because the digital assets sector is largely unregulated and unstable, which could put investors at financial risks.

“Our submission highlights that VDA (Virtual Digital Assets) service providers are now covered as ‘reporting entities’ under the PMLA (Prevention of Money Laundering Act) and are also registered with the FIU (Financial Intelligence Unit). We believe that these guardrails go a long way in helping secure VDA transactions and arresting malfeasance, if any,” the Coindesk report quoted the source as saying.

The BWA comprises of several members of India’s corporate crypto community. The aim of this organisation is to open discussions with the Indian government around the dos and don’ts that will impact India’s budding crypto ecosystem.

Google I/O 2023 saw the search giant repeatedly tell us that it cares about AI, alongside the launch of its first foldable phone and Pixel-branded tablet. This year, the company is going to supercharge its apps, services, and Android operating system with AI technology. We discuss this and more on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
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PhonePe Raises $100 Million From General Atlantic, Investors During Ongoing Fundraise

Walmart-owned Indian payments firm PhonePe on Wednesday said it had raised an additional $100 million (roughly Rs. 820 crores) from General Atlantic and other investors as part of its ongoing $1 billion (roughly Rs. 82,063 crores) fundraising to expand into the lucrative lending space.

With the latest round, PhonePe, India’s most valuable payments firm with an estimated value of $12 billion (roughly Rs. 9,84,744 crores) has raised $650 million (roughly Rs. 533 crores) across four tranches from its backers, including Tiger Global.

General Atlantic had invested $350 (roughly Rs. 287 crores) million in the fintech during the same funding round in January.

At over 46 percent, PhonePe in March had the largest market share among applications running the unified payments interface (UPI) digital payments system, per data from the National Payments Corporation of India.

Recently, the digital payments firm PhonePe launched an app called Pincode on the Indian government’s open network to strengthen its e-commerce business.

The Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) was launched last year to enable small merchants and local stores across India to access processes and technologies typically deployed by large e-commerce platforms like Amazon and Walmart.

Pincode, which will focus on hyperlocal commerce, is currently live only in Bengaluru and available on the Google Play Store and the App Store, PhonePe said in a statement. It said categories on the app will include groceries, food, pharma, electronics, home decor, and fashion.

The company is targeting 100,000 orders a day on the app by December, Chief Executive Sameer Nigam said, adding that it would not launch the service in more than 10 cities in the first year.

PhonePe already has an e-commerce platform, called Switch, on its app, which offers services including food delivery, grocery shopping, travel, hotel booking, retail fashion, and healthcare. 

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