Industry hails RBI's accommodative stance

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SME Times News Bureau | 04 Dec, 2020
The payments industry on Friday welcomed the Reserve Bank of India's move to hike the limit of contactless card transaction from Rs 2,000 to Rs 5,000.

The announcement by Reserve Bank of India Governor Shaktikanta Das comes at a time when contactless payments have gained traction amid the pandemic.

The new limit will be effective from January 1, 2021 and will be at the discretion of the user.

"We welcome the RBI's announcement to enhance limits for contactless card transactions and e-mandates. Since Visa launched its contactless cards in India over five years ago, consumers have continued to prefer contactless cards for their small ticket, daily use purchases," T R Ramachandran, Group Country Manager, India & South Asia, Visa, said in a statement.

"As evident in recent months, there is strong consumer preference for digital payments and the new enhanced limits for e-mandates and contactless cards will help transition millions of Indian consumers from cash to fast, convenient and secure forms of digital payments," Ramachandran said.

Visa also welcomed RBI's plans to pursue a uniform security framework for digital payment channels in the county via the proposed Digital Payment Security Controls Directions.

In a virtual press conference after the monetary policy meet, the RBI Governor said that all banks and other financial institutions should invest more on their IT systems and technology.

"At Mswipe, contactless payments have spiralled from 13 per cent of total transactions in January 2020 to 30 per cent of total transactions in November 2020," said Manish Patel, Founder and CEO, Mswipe.

Mswipe provides a wide range of digital payment solutions for SMEs in India including UPI QR, NFC based Tap and Pay, POS and Payment Link.

The social distancing measures adopted to avoid contracting the virus gave the initial push for contactless transactions in India.

"The convenience and quickness that contactless payments bring to end consumer and merchants during check out stage was the real driving factor that saw continuous growth in contactless payments, especially QR month on month this year," Patel said.