Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das on February 8, 2023 shared the proposal to permit Unified Payments Interface (UPI) for merchant payments to inbound travellers in India.
This is the latest of guidelines related to ease of payments that the RBI has issued at its MPC. Previously, these include those on secured payments on payment gateways and card processing companies, interoperability of the Bharat Bill Payment System and cash withdrawal using UPI.
Das said that UPI has now become a ubiquitous payment instrument for retail electronic payments in the country, and now it has been decided to provide UPI access to inbound travellers to India, so they can 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,” he said.
Going forward, this facility will be enabled across all other entry points in the country.
“Necessary operational instructions will be issued shortly,” he said.
In addition, to improve distribution of coins among members of the public, Das said the RBI is also working on a pilot project on QR Code based Coin Vending Machine (QCVM) in collaboration with a few leading banks.
QCVM is a cashless coin dispensation machine, which would dispense coins against a debit to the customer’s bank account using the UPI.
So, unlike the cash-based traditional Coin Vending Machine, QCVM would eliminate the need for physical tendering of banknotes and their authentication, as the “customers will also have the option to withdraw coins in required quantity and denominations in QCVMs.”
The pilot project is planned to be initially rolled out at 19 locations in 12 cities across India.
These vending machines are intended to be installed at public places, such as railway stations, shopping malls, marketplaces to enhance accessibility and based on the learnings from the pilot tests, guidelines would be issued to banks to promote better distribution of coins using QCVMs.
