NPCI calls for using digital payments to reduce social contact and contain Covid-19 outbreak

NPCI has also fast-tracked the onboarding system of UPI/UPI-QR to make it totally contactless and fully online, for both vendors and merchants. With this customers can use UPI to pay for essentials and transfer money digitally without the risk of physical contact.
The National Payment Corporation of India (NPCI) has come out with a circular urging Indians to use digital payments, especially during the coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis. This is to reduce social contact without the exchange of cash notes and coins, therefore reducing the chance of transmission of COVID-19. NPCI, along with banks and ecosystem partners, will help every citizen during the current lockdown period through robust digital payment infrastructure.

Dilip Asbe, NPCI MD and CEO said, “In the current lock-down situation, all service providers of essential services and consumers should switch to digital payments methods to stay protected.” NPCI and the State Governments are ensuring that more and more vendors of essential services are on the digital platforms, so as to maintain social distancing in this critical scenario.

NPCI said they are improvising to meet the requirements for COVID19, across all of their payment systems. The infrastructure will also support the additional load on the UPI platform, as more and more users will now be tapping into the system for ease and safety of digital transactions.

NPCI has also fast-tracked the onboarding system of UPI/UPI-QR to make it totally contactless and fully online, for both vendors and merchants. With this customers can use UPI to pay for essentials and transfer money digitally without the risk of physical contact.
Last week, NPCI allowed payment service providers to offer the facility to make cash withdrawals using the UPI. This service will be in line with the existing facility available at ‘Cash at Point-of-Sale (PoS)’ enabled by the cards.

For this facility, in tier-1 and tier-2 centers transaction limits have been set at Rs 1,000 per day and in tier-3 to tier-6 centers Rs 2,000 per day. Note that only 3 transactions will be allowed per account per payee UPI ID. Service providers can also charge customers up to 1 per cent of transaction value, up to Rs 10, on such cash withdrawal.

Here is the list of apps that allow UPI transactions: