The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said in May 2021 that all prepaid cards and wallets that are full-KYC compliant must be fully interoperable – mutually compatible – by March 31, 2022.
The rules are aimed at accelerating the migration of small and convenience payments from cash to PPI instruments and wallets. They also require PPIs to be compliant with the same level of security and customer support as mandated for UPI, so customers can have the confidence to adopt them.
With the launch of Juspay’s OpenPPI, existing and prospective PPI players can comply with the new rules using an end-to-end secure cloud solution, the company said. The OpenPPI solution will enable interoperability for PPIs through the Unified Payments Interface (UPI).
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The National Payments Corporation of India, which runs UPI, is working with payment players to comply with the RBI’s norms, and is in advance talks on the merchant discount rates (MDR) to be charged in the PPI-interoperability setup.
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“Implementing PPI Interoperability is a game-changer to increase the adoption of UPI and PPIs. Interoperability essentially means that your wallet can now act as your bank account, letting you transfer money from wallets or cards seamlessly. It opens up multiple possibilities for wallet use. A person can now scan any UPI QR code and pay with their wallet balance through UPI, instead of using their bank account,” said Sheetal Lalwani, cofounder and chief operating officer (COO) of Juspay.
Last December, Juspay raised $60 million in a funding round led by SoftBank Vision Fund II. SoftBank put in $50 million while the rest came from the existing investors VEF and Wellington Management, the company said.
