Amid the second Covid-19 wave that has led to lockdowns in many States, digital payments continued to fall for a second consecutive month in May. Exception was payments through Bharat BillPay and Aadhaar Enabled Payment System (AePS).

Transactions through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) fell to a three-month low, according to data released by the National Payments Corporation of India.

The number of transactions on BHIM UPI fell to 253 crore in May amounting to ₹4.9 lakh crore as against 264 crore transactions worth ₹4.93 lakh crore in April. UPI transactions had crossed the ₹5-lakh crore in March, but has been falling since then due to the lockdowns.

Lower mobility

Similarly, transactions on the Immediate Payments Service platform also continued to slide down in May. As many as 27.98 crore transactions totalling ₹2.66 lakh crore were processed through IMPS in May. In comparison, 32.2 crore payments worth ₹2.99 lakh crore were made through IMPS in April.

Reflecting the lower mobility, transactions through FASTags also declined. A total of 11.64 crore transactions valued at ₹2,125.16 crore took place through NETC FASTags in May as against 16.43 crore transactions worth ₹2,776.9 crore in April this year.

With people preferring to stay at home and avoid crowds, payments on Bharat BillPay surged to 3.92 crore in May after a slight dip in April when it was at 3.53 crore. Payments worth ₹6,270.31 crore took place through the platform in May compared to ₹5,201.92 crore in April.

The number of live billers on Bharat BillPay also rose to 20,186 last month from 19,954 in April.

AePS transactions also rose to 8.42 crore in May amounting to a total of ₹24,619.24 crore as against 7.4 crore transactions worth ₹22,139.05 crore in April.

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