How UPI's Money Mantra Is Reverberating Louder across The World

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Singapore counterpart, Lee Hsien Loong, will witness the launch of cross-border connectivity between the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) of India and PayNow of Singapore on Tuesday. This marks yet another instance of UPI going global.

UPI is best in class, a completely open and interoperable payment platform. Since being introduced as a payment system in India, it has not only revolutionised the financial lives of Indians, but India’s digital payment system is steadily becoming globally attractive and is being adopted by other countries as well, top government officials told News18.

Countries that have adopted it:

Bhutan

NPCI International Payments Ltd (NIPL), the international arm of National Payment Corporation of India, and Royal Monetary Authority (RMA) of Bhutan partnered for enabling and implementing BHIM UPI QR-based payments in Bhutan.

Nepal

Nepal became the first foreign country to deploy UPI as a payment platform. With the collaboration between Nepal’s Manam Infotech and Gateway Payments Service, person-to-person (P2P), person-to-merchant (P2M), and cross-border payments have been made operational.

Malaysia

Merchantrade Asia has partnered with NPCI International to offer real-time remittances to India. This partnership has enabled Merchantrade and its network to connect to NIPL and facilitate remittances to beneficiary banks in India via UPI.

Oman

A memorandum of understanding signed between the Central Bank of Oman (CBO) and NIPL has enabled Indian RuPay cards and the UPI platform in Oman to facilitate seamless digital remittances, to benefit Indian workers and professionals.

UAE

NIPL has partnered with LuLu Financial Holdings, Mashreq Bank, and Network International in the UAE to enable UPI payments.

Other Asian countries

NIPL partnered with Liquid Group, a leading cross-border digital payments provider, to enable UPI QR-based payments acceptance in ten markets across north and southeast Asia. With this, UPI can be enabled in Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, Cambodia, Hong Kong, Taiwan, South Korea, and Japan

France

France-based payment services provider Lyra Network signed an agreement with the NIPL, allowing students and tourists to make payments through UPI.

UK

To further strengthen cross-border payment solutions, TerraPay and ​PayXpert signed an agreement with NIPL. These partnerships have enabled Indian customers and merchants in India with an active UPI ID to make and accept cross-border payments seamlessly.

Other European countries

NIPL has entered into a partnership with European payment services facilitator Worldline, with the intention of expanding acceptance of Indian payment channels across Europe, especially in countries such as the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, etc.

Under the partnership, Worldline’s QR code-based mechanism will allow merchants’ point-of-sale (PoS) systems in Europe to accept UPI payments from Indians using their mobile phones.

And the latest, Singapore

According to the government, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor Shaktikanta Das and Ravi Menon, managing director of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), will lead the launch of this cross-border connectivity, with the two PMs watching the launch through videoconferencing on February 21.

The Centre believes that the integration of these two payment systems would allow residents of both countries to send cross-border remittances more quickly and cheaply. Additionally, it is expected to benefit the Indian diaspora in Singapore, particularly migrant workers, and students, by allowing for instant and low-cost money transfers from Singapore to India and vice versa.

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