At the moment, France and Nepal accept UPI payments via QR codes for merchant (e-commerce) payments
The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and NPCI International Payments (NIPL) have plans to expand the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) to 20 countries by FY29. The RBI Annual Report states that initiatives would be taken to increase UPI and RuPay global reach. “In light of goals for Viksit Bharat 2047, the Reserve Bank, along with NPCI International Payments Ltd. (NIPL) will work towards taking UPI to 20 countries with initiation timeline of 2024-25 and completion timeline of 2028-29,” RBI in its annual report stated.
The report further mentions that the Fast Payment System (FPS) collaboration with a group of countries such as European Union and South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), as well as multilateral linkages will be explored. At the moment, France and Nepal accept UPI payments via QR codes for merchant (e-commerce) payments. However, India has several agreements for UPI payments with seven other nations.
The RBI’s Payments Vision Document 2025 has designated the global rollout of UPI and RuPay cards as one of its primary goals. The report also stated that the RBI is in talks to establish cooperative arrangements with different central banks.
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Prior to this, RuPay cards and UPI connectivity between India and Mauritius was launched in February, which allows Indian travellers in Mauritius to pay merchants using UPI apps and vice versa for Mauritian travellers in India. Similarly, UPI connectivity between India and Sri Lanka was also established during the same month with an aim to enable Indian travellers to make QR code-based payments at merchant locations in Sri Lanka using UPI apps.
At present, the payments ecosystem (card networks/banks/PPI entities) has largely adopted SMS-based one-time password (OTP) as an additional factor of authentication (AFA). However, with the advancements in technology, various innovative solutions are now available to address the fraud and friction in payments.
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Interestingly, an alternate risk-based authentication mechanism leveraging behavioural biometrics, location/ historical payments, digital tokens, and in app notifications will be explored.
Moreover, for cross-border payments, the RBI and Nepal Rastra Bank are looking into connecting Nepal’s National Payments Interface with India’s UPI network. To that end, NIPL and Nepal Clearing House Ltd. (NCHL) inked a Memorandum of Understanding in June 2023.
