Send, Receive Money From Singapore Using UPI: PayNow Gets Linked With UPI

The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) unveiled an initiative on Tuesday to link the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and PayNow, to enable “instant, low-cost fund transfers,”

“The UPI-PayNow linkage will enable users of each of the two fast payment systems to make instant, low-cost fund transfers on a reciprocal basis without a need to get onboarded onto the other payment system,”

-RBI

India’s UPI And Singapore’s PayNow Will Be Linked 

 Monetary Authority of Singapore in a press statement said “When implemented, fund transfers can be made from India to Singapore using mobile phone numbers, and from Singapore to India using UPI virtual payment addresses (VPA). The experience of making a PayNow transfer to a UPI VPA will be similar to that of a domestic transfer to a PayNow VPA,” 

“This initiative is also in line with RBI’s vision of reviewing corridors and charges for inbound cross-border remittances outlined in the Payment Systems Vision Document 2019-21,” it added.

By When The Cross Border Payments Will Be Operational?

The project to link India’s Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and Singapore’s PayNow is expected to be operational by July 2022, according to both countries’ central banks. 

For both the platform, Users will be able to send money to each other. Users need not join up for the other, according to the institutions.

According to the report by Citi earlier this year “The fees are extremely high. It is embarrassing that we have not solved this issue so far,” The global average cost for sending money is around 6.5%.

“The UPI-PayNow linkage is a significant milestone in the development of infrastructure for cross-border payments between India and Singapore, and closely aligns with the G20’s financial inclusion priorities of driving faster, cheaper and more transparent cross-border payments,”

“The linkage builds upon the earlier efforts of NPCI International Private Limited (NIPL) and Network for Electronic Transfers (NETS) to foster cross-border interoperability of payments using cards and QR codes, between India and Singapore and will further anchor trade, travel and remittance flows between the two countries.”

-RBI