Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) won't need to obtain an Indian mobile number in order to make payments using the Unified Payments Interface (UPI). NRIs in ten nations can digitally transfer money utilising the UPI platform from NRE/NRO accounts according to the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI).
Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) in ten countries can use UPI services without relying on their India phone number for transactions.
The list of countries are: Singapore, US, Australia, Canada, Hong Kong, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, UAE and UK.
Partner banks have until April 30 to follow the rules, according to the Payments Corporation.
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While an NRO account assists NRIs in managing revenue received in India, an NRE account enables them to transfer foreign profits to India.
The sole requirements are that banks confirm that such accounts are permitted in accordance with Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) regulations, adhere to Reserve Bank of India (RBI) standards, and take precautions to prevent money laundering or the financing of terrorism.
An initiative to promote RuPay debit cards and low-value BHIM-UPI transactions was authorised by a cabinet committee led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and budgeted at 2,600 crores.
This facility may be extended to other country codes in future.
The remitter and beneficiary banks must also guarantee that the appropriate anti-money laundering or counter-terrorist financing checks and compliance validation in accordance with the requirements are made.
The chief convenience aspect for NRI visitors to India, according to Vishwas Patel, Chairman of the Payments Council of India, will be in the form of "payment/money transfer convenience."
NRIs will just need to link their NRE and NRO accounts linked to their international SIM to UPI and use it like any other Indian UPI user for merchant payment as well as peer-to-peer payments.
