Customers won't have to pay any additional fees for using UPI yet.
In India, UPI (Unified Payments Interface) is the most preferred payment system for users to transfer money between bank accounts instantly, using their mobile phones. That is why, many were confused and full of questions after The National Payments Corporation of India announced an interchange fee on UPI transactions of over Rs 2,000 made through Prepaid Payment Instruments from April 1.
As soon as the news was announced, social media users took to their accounts to vent and express their displeasure. However, the NPCI soon clarified that the new fee is only applicable to merchant transactions made through prepaid payment instruments.
The fee will not apply for person-to-person transactions or person-to-merchant transactions between a bank and the prepaid wallet. Some examples of wallets include Paytm Wallet, PhonePe Wallet, Amazon Pay, Freecharge Wallet, etc. Simply put, customers won't have to pay any additional fees for using UPI.
The Internet was deluged with hilarious memes, only to gradually settle after the government's clarification. #UPIcharges and #UPIPayments were among the top trends on Twitter.
Here are some tweets that are doing the rounds on social media:
In August last year, the Finance Ministry stated that UPI is a digital public good and that it was not considering levying any charges on transactions made through it.
''UPI is a digital public good with immense convenience for the public & productivity gains for the economy. There is no consideration in Govt to levy any charges for UPI services. The concerns of the service providers for cost recovery have to be met through other means,'' the ministry tweeted.
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