UPI payment for G20 nations: Here’s how it will work, banks involved

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has announced that the cross-border UPI payment mechanism for the G20 member nations will be available at Bengaluru, Mumbai and New Delhi international airports.

At the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting on February 8, RBI had announced the introduction of UPI for international travellers, starting with G20 member nations.

Also Read: RBI allows UPI access for international travellers from G20 countries

Earlier, Finance Minister had also said that the NPCI is taking UPI international, helping countries create payment systems and 338 banks are already live on UPI platform. “Countries like Singapore, Bhutan, France are interested in India's payment systems,” she had said.

How will it work?

At the select international airports, eligible travellers would be issued Prepaid Payment Instruments (PPI) wallets linked to UPI for making payments at merchant outlets.

Delegates from G20 countries can also avail this facility at various meeting venues.

To begin with, ICICI Bank, IDFC First Bank and two non-bank PPI issuers, Pine Labs Private Limited and Transcorp International Limited will issue UPI linked wallets, RBI said.

Travellers visiting India can now experience the convenience of UPI payments at over five crore merchant outlets across India, that accept QR Code-based UPI payments.

It is to be noted that globally, India has the highest real-time transaction volume, which is threefold of the closest challenger China. Minimalistic interface and user-friendly experience are the two key pillars responsible for the growth of UPI.

Yesterday, India had jointly launched cross-border payment mechanism UPI-PayNow with Singapore. The launch was done in presence of Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with his Singapore counterpart Lee Hsien Loong.

Also Read: New milestone: PM Modi, Singapore’s Loong witness launch of UPI-PayNow

Earlier, ETBFSI had exclusively reported the completion of the project.

“The pilot project has been completed successfully. There are enough case studies. It’s just a matter of time before the project will be launched,” a person directly involved with the project had told ETBFSI.

Also Read: Most awaited India-Singapore UPI linkage complete, to be launched by PM Modi soon

At the MPC, RBI Governor had said, “UPI has become a ubiquitous payment instrument for retail electronic payments in India. An enhancement has recently been made to provide UPI access to non-resident Indians who have international mobile numbers linked to their NRE / NRO accounts.”

“It is now proposed to permit all inbound travellers to India also to access UPI for their merchant payments (P2M) while they are in the country. To start with, this facility will be extended to travellers from the G-20 countries, arriving at select international airports. Going forward, this facility will be enabled across all other entry points in the country. Necessary operational instructions will be issued shortly,” he had added.