The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) recently introduced UPI Lite to take the digital payments experience to the next level. The move is expected to make digital payment more convenient to users when it comes to low-value transactions.
As per the data of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), low-value transactions happen more in India. With UPI Lite, users can make small-value transactions even without the internet. It will cut down the debit load on the core banking system.
How to use UPI Lite?
Using UPI Lite, feature phone users can access UPI networks and make digital payments straight from their bank accounts. First, customers should add funds from their bank accounts to the app using the internet. The UPI Lite balance in the app is only a virtual ‘on-device’ balance. The real money or funds is held and maintained by the issuing bank. To carry out transactions, no internet is required. There is also no need for separate authorisation or UPI PIN.
Currently, eight banks such as Canara Bank, HDFC Bank, Indian Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Punjab National Bank. State Bank of India, Union Bank of India, and Utkarsh Small Finance Bank offer the service. The upper limit for UPI Lite payment transactions is Rs 200. The total limit of UPI Lite balance for an on-device wallet is Rs 2,000. Once UPI Lite is disabled, the unused balance will be credited to the account by the issuing bank.
The UPI Lite transactions except top-up transactions won’t appear in the account statement. However, users will get an SMS message from the bank.
