WhatsApp has now extended its own payment Unified Payments Interface or UPI-based payment feature for more users.
Two sources who are close to the development have confirmed this news. As we all know this feature was extended by WhatsApp to 20 million users in November 2020.
Read on to find out more about this new development!
WhatsApp To Extend User Base Beyond 2 Million For WhatsApp Pay
In November 2020, NPCI or National Payments Corporation of India, which runs and controls UPI had given the green signal to Whatsapp for launching their Whatsapp Pay services in India. In the first phase, 2 crore Indian users were enabled to use Whatsapp Pay via their app.
Whatsapp Pay is reportedly supported by more than 140 banks and will not charge any fees for transferring money.
And now, news is that the Whatsapp Pay feature will be rolled out for more users now. As per the sources, “NPCI [National Payments Corporation of India] has allowed WhatsApp to onboard more users and possibly its payment feature is now available for all. The formal announcement is likely soon.”
As of now, Whatsapp has also joined hands with SBI, ICICI, HDFC and Axis Bank to process the payments through UPI.
NPCI enlists all third party apps on its site, which includes Whatsapp too. All the apps that are allowed for limited users are denoted with a # sign that indicates a caveat that it is for a limited number of users only.
Until recently, this sign was in front of WhatsApp too. However, as of Monday, the NPCI has removed the # symbol from WhatsApp, which shows that WhatsApp has now been given the go ahead to get as many users as it can on board.
How To Use WhatsApp Pay?
To check if you have received Whatsapp Pay feature or not, click the menu on the home screen (top right, three vertical dots).
You will find the Payment option.
If you have this option, then you will need to add your bank, verify and confirm.
Once the bank has been added, you can open any chat window, click on the Clip icon, enter the amount, UPI pin, and transfer the money.
WhatsApp’s payment feature has not been a great success. Only 310,000 UPI transactions were carried out through Whatsapp Pay in the month of November, 2020. While the competitors like Google Pay and Phonepe alone experienced around 8.5 Cr and 8.3 Cr transactions respectively.