With just about 10 days left for the tokenisation deadline, banks and merchants have started alerting customers about the need to permit tokenisation of their card data.

According to players, full preparedness of the ecosystem is still some time away though most large banks and merchants are ready for the new norms that come into effect from January 1.

Customers can continue shopping by putting in their card data each time or using options like UPI or cash options.

“Axis Bank is in the process of making the necessary changes to be fully compliant with the new guidelines. Certain merchants have already completed the required changes and customers can tokenise their card and save details even now at these merchants. More merchants are expected to be live by the end of the year with the proposed changes. We are communicating this to our customers via SMS and emails and have also created detailed FAQs for customers to know more,” said Sanjeev Moghe, EVP and Head, Cards and Payments, Axis Bank.

Firms getting ready

Others lenders like ICICI Bank and merchants such as Uber, Amazon, Zomato and many others have already started informing customers and seeking approval to tokenise their card data.

“If you provide your consent to tokenise your card, the card details will be stored in a secured tokenised format…” ICICI Bank said in a recent communication to customers.

However, American Express informed customers: “We are currently working towards the solution to enable faster checkout option through card tokenisation. We will notify you with details closer to the launch.”

According to Manas Mishra, Chief Product Officer, PayU India while there may be inefficiencies, it may take about six to nine months more for the entire ecosystem to be fully ready.

“PayU is completely prepared to enable tokenisation solutions for the broader ecosystem. 'PayU Token Hub' offers robust combination of network (Visa, Mastercard) and issuer tokens under a single hub. PayU has been fully certified by Mastercard and Visa as a token requestor and token provider,” he said.

If a merchant has not integrated with the card network with the bank issuing the card by December 31, the consumer may have to enter card details again and again for every transaction, but the transaction will not be declined, he further said.

Ishan Sharma, VP, Business Development, Juspay noted that a large part of the industry is getting activated for tokenisation.

“But token issuances are just one leg of token creation. One of the most critical legs is that after the token is issued, and the card associated with the token is deleted, the subsequent transaction should also process. Our teams are working with all the ecosystem partners to test all this,” he said, adding that some flows might be affected.

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