Smeeral Raju Swamy, Pune
The earlier limit was Rs 1 lakh; the new limit has been reduced to Rs 5 lakh. The objective of the increase in the limit is to facilitate enhanced convenience for customers in the high value tax business. Earlier, except for hospital and educational bill payments which had a limit of Rs. 5 lakhs, UPI transactions were limited to Rs. 1 lakh. Thus, by extending this higher limit to tax payments the new regulation allows the volumes of such transactions that consumers make directly through UPI.
- When was the new feature announced?
It cropped up on Thursday 8th of August during the monetary policy announcement by the RBI Governor Shaktikanta Das. It will be convenient for customers to use the UPI for payments of taxes.
Delegated Payments is a new feature.
Second great difference is about the new feature called Delegated Payments in UPI. It offers a feature of allowing one person (primary user) to enable another person (secondary user) to do UPI transactions from primary users bank accounts up to a certain limit.
- What is the new feature and how does it work?
This feature will enable the customers of the primary account holder to allow other users also known as the secondary users, to initiate the UPI transaction form his/her account with certain transaction amount control by the primary user.
By this feature, it is now possible to enable two family members to transact online via one bank account for UPI.
‘This would allow a person to allow another person to carryout transactions up to a certain limit from the first person’s bank account without any need for the second person to link his or her account to UPI,’ as the governor of the central bank of India put it.
This feature is likely to enhance the usage of UPI by different sections of the population not having their own bank accounts linked to UPI, such as children and seniors. Dilip Asbe, CEO of the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), which operates UPI, commented on social media: “Nothing boring ever for payment systems in India. “
RBI (Reserve Bank of India) aims to increase the reach and capabilities of digital payments to increase UPI (Unified Payments Interface) usage in the country and by making it more convenient for customers.