After two years of testing, the WhatsApp payment service on Thursday received approval from National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) to go live on Unified Payment Interface (UPI) in the multi-bank model.
WhatsApp can expand its UPI user base in a graded manner starting with a maximum registered user base of 20 million in UPI, NPCI said. The Facebook-owned private messaging service has over 400 million users in India.
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The move comes after NPCI in August had informed the Reserve Bank of India that WhatsApp had met data localization requirements. Brazil became the first country to roll out the WhatsApp payment service in June.
In India, the WhatsApp payment service will compete against other major players like Google Pay and PhonePe, among others.
SOURCES: IANS