UPI transactions crosses 500 cr mark in March, set new record

Reasons for growth of UPI transaction

• Acceptance at a huge number of merchant locations with easy, rapid, and frictionless payments, including the use of QR codes, is critical aspect in UPI's massive size

• Customers' 'trust' behaviour, is the result of the availability of extremely secure UPI architecture

• The pandemic also aided in boosting digital payments usage, including UPI transactions

• Govt's massive push for digital transactions, including demonetization

Mumbai: Unified Payments Interface (UPI) transaction crossed the 500 crore mark in volumes for the first time in March. In FY22, 60 per cent of volumes of India's retail payments came from UPI which will further lead greater digital adoption for payments and financial services, an NPCI data revealed.

Kiya.ai manages 20 per cent of overall UPI transactions in the country. Talking to Bizz Buzz on the outlook for UPI payments in FY23, Manoj Chopra, Head (Innovation and Product Development), Kiya.ai said: "The last month has been an interesting phase for the merchant and financial space, the transactions nearly doubled. Crossing the 5 billion transaction mark before the conclusion of the fiscal year has been a watershed moment in UPI payments history."

Acceptance at a huge number of merchant locations with easy, rapid, and frictionless payments, including the use of QR codes, is another critical aspect in UPI's massive size. Customers' 'trust' behaviour, on the other side, is the result of the availability of extremely secure UPI architecture. To a considerable extent, the pandemic also aided in boosting digital payments usage, including UPI transactions, and, most critically, the government's massive push for digital transactions, including demonetization.

The growth, he said, is bound to accelerate further through NPCI's new innovative features like AutoPay and Prepaid vouchers. UPI123Pay and UPI lite will drive the adoption of UPI in the rural sector. Also, with UPI now gaining acceptance globally in geographies like Singapore, Bhutan, UAE, and Nepal, we expect UPI transaction to cross 1 billion monthly transaction milestone by 2025.

UPI crossed the $1-trillion mark in transaction values for the financial year 2021-22. Dilip Modi, Founder, Spice Money, said: "We are delighted to see the exponential rise of the adoption of UPI, especially in the last two years driven by the pandemic. Both the volume and value of UPI transactions have doubled in a year's time." This indicates the country's receptiveness to digital financial interventions and sets a firm foundation for further similar initiatives. Additionally, given the ability of digital to connect the farthest corners of the country, there is immense potential for it to empower rural India and bridge the urban-rural divide. India is evidently building a world-leading digital financial infrastructure with inclusion built into the core. Initiatives such as UPI lite which aims to encourage small-ticket offline digital payments, and UPI123Pay allowing transactions to be done through feature phones without an internet connection will further the reach of the digital payments ecosystem.

"We're looking forward to being a part of NPCI's journey towards processing a billion transactions a day in the coming year, especially keen on front-ending this journey in rural India," Modi said.