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From around 41.52 lakh monthly transactions in January 2017, the Unified Payment Interface (UPI) came a long way to end the year with around 14.5 crore transactions in December 2017.
UPI is the mobile-only digital payment mechanism of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
The latest data on the official Twitter handle of Bharat Interface for Money (BHIM) shows that 14.5 crore transactions worth around ₹13,174 crore were processed on the UPI platform in December.
The number of monthly transactions had reached the 10.5-crore mark in November. Around ₹9,669 crore was transacted in these transactions during that month.
Around ₹7,057 crore was transacted in 7.69 crore transactions on the UPI platform in October.
Though the UPI was launched in August 2016, its usage gained momentum after the demonetisation of specified bank notes on November 8, 2016.
The report on ‘Trend and Progress of Banking in India’ for 2016-17, which was released by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) recently, stated that 1.79 crore transactions worth ₹6,950 crore took place through the UPI platform during 2016-17.
In fact, the number of monthly transactions had just crossed the one-crore mark in June 2017.
UPI offers seamless transaction of money via smartphones — like sending an e-mail — with two-factor authentication. People can transfer money using the mobile number or the virtual payment address (VPA). This helps in avoiding problems related to wrong entries of bank account number and other details.
The NPCI came out with its own mobile app — BHIM in December 2016 — on the UPI platform to make instant bank-to-bank payments and to pay and collect money using just mobile numbers or VPAs.
Private players such as ‘PhonePe’ and ‘Tez’ have been contributing significantly to the growth of the UPI platform in the country.
PhonePe, a mobile app based on the UPI platform, had stated in December that it had processed over 10 lakh daily transactions in November 2017. Google had launched its payment app Tez on the UPI platform in September.
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