The National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) is currently working on readying its real-time payment dispute resolution system for the Unified Payment Interface (UPI). Set to be operational by September 2022, the in-app feature is expected to resolve nearly 80-90 per cent of payment failures in real-time, NPCI MD & CEO Dilip Asbe said.
Speaking at a virtual conference held by IMF – Singapore Regional Training Institute, Asbe said, “On the regulator’s directive, we are trying to get as much as data published to provide complete transparency on data, including on downtime, disputes on NPCI website. We are now working on first-of-its-kind online dispute resolution. Over the next three months’ time, 80-90 per cent of disputes caused by payment issues between a variety of participants of the large supply chain of UPI ecosystem will get resolved online.”
He added, “In next three months’ time, customers will no longer need to call the bank or go anywhere else but just get the UPI help on their app and the dispute will be resolved automatically in real time. And by end of September, at least 90 per cent of the UPI failures will be resolved in real-time.”
In April, NPCI had asked all banks, payment service providers (PSPs) and third-party application providers (TPAPs) to implement an online dispute resolution system by September, failing which they will be barred from adding new customers.
The NPCI is currently working on several innovations, including UPI AutoPay for recurring payments, UPI Lite to enable near-offline payments for small-ticket transactions, and even voice-based payments focussing on feature phones.
“UPI is being used for IPO applications as well. We have delivered this using one-time mandate block functionality in the account. About 60 per cent of retail application in the primary markets are now being made using UPI. Our effort is to now increase it to 80 per cent,” Asbe said.
He added, “We also have UPI AutoPay for recurring payments. Currently that solution works domestically, but we plan to expand it to international markets as well. As of date, we process about 5 million new recurring mandates on a monthly basis. Our objective is to take it to 25-30 million new mandates which are registered on monthly basis. This helps SaaS and OTT companies collect money in a convenient manner.”