Amazon Pay, Google Pay and National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI)-run Bharat Interface for Money (Bhim) are testing the feature, UPI Circle, in a closed user group and are expected to go live in the coming months.
PhonePe, the largest third-party application on UPI, is also testing the product, ET has learnt.
NPCI officially launched UPI Circle last week at the Global Fintech Fest in Mumbai.
UPI Circle is a delegated payment method where the primary user can give permission to a secondary user to undertake transactions. The primary user can either authenticate each transaction or set a limit of up to Rs 15,000 within which any transaction can go through without any explicit nod.
“This feature can be used extensively by senior citizens, children especially in households where there is one bank account… It will be enabled within a trusted network,” said Vikas Bansal, chief executive officer of Amazon Pay.
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A whole lot of new users will get activated on UPI, he said.Also Read | RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das’ 5-point agenda for India’s financial future at GFF 2024
Some possible use cases listed on NPCI site include junior college students making cash-free payments using their parents’ UPI accounts, housemaids shopping on behalf of their employers and drivers filling fuel on behalf of car owners.
“Given the frauds happening on digital payments and the vulnerability of children and elderly members of the family, UPI Circle will keep the control over the product in the hands of the primary account holder,” a top executive at a Bengaluru-based payments major said on condition of anonymity.
Industry insiders said the feature where the primary user will have to authenticate each transaction done by the secondary user is expected to show wider adoption.
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The executive quoted above said NPCI has been trying to grow the base of users active on UPI, and young consumers and the elderly have been on their radar for some time. The thinking is to get the user base on UPI beyond the 300 million number and get more active users onto the platform.
In a blog post published on August 30, Google said UPI Circle will help take one step further in the direction of a more inclusive and convenient financial ecosystem.