In order to increase the usage of UPI-Lite wallet in places where internet access is poor or unavailable, the Reserve Bank of India has increased the upper limit of an offline payment transaction from Rs 200 to Rs 500.
On the other hand, the overall limit for offline transactions on a payment instrument remains to Rs 2,000 at all times.
“As announced in the Statement on Development and Regulatory Policies dated August 10, 2023, the upper limit of an offline payment transaction is increased to Rs 500. Other instructions mentioned in the framework shall continue to remain applicable as before,” according to an RBI notification.
According to a report by The Economic Times, this will enable faster, more reliable and contactless payments for daily purchases of small value, transit payments and so on by eliminating the need for two-factor verification for small value transactions.
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What is UPI Lite?UPI Lite is an on-device wallet feature that allow users to make real-time small value payments without using UPI PIN.
How to use UPI Lite?Money must be transferred to The app’s wallet from your bank account. Then, this amount can be used to make payments via UPI Lite from the wallet.
“Both UPI lite and NCMC card work as wallet and the pre-loaded money in App/Card can be spend near offline mode, i.e. debit (payments) can be made without an Internet connection and credits into the account will be done online.
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As the NCMC card can be used at ATM, online payments etc, so the increase in transaction limit to Rs 500 will enhance use of cash-less transactions through UPI lite and NCMC card,” said Dr Soumya Kanti Ghosh, Group Chief Economic Advisor, State Bank of India to The Economic Times.
