Cashback and discount: Modi govt's mega plan to boost digital transactions

The government is working on a proposal to incentivise digital transactions by providing cashbacks to businesses and price benefits to consumers, a source said.

As per the proposal being worked out by the Revenue Department, consumers paying through the digital mode would be offered a discount over the maximum retail price (MRP). The discount would be capped at Rs 100.

Businesses, on the other hand, could get a cashback based on the quantum of turnover through the digital mode.

The proposals to encourage digital transactions are likely to be placed before the GST Council, chaired by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley and comprising state ministers, on May 4.

According to the source, the issue of providing incentive for digital transaction was discussed at a meeting held in the Prime Minister's Office.

During the meeting, three possible modes of incentivising businesses to go in for digital transactions were discussed. Apart from cashbacks, a proposal to allow businesses to obtain tax credit on the basis of turnover obtained through digital mode was also discussed.

WhatsApp buys into Modi's vision, to launch digital payments in India first

Instant messaging app WhatsApp, owned by Facebook Inc, is mulling a foray into digital payment services in India, its first such offering globally, and has advertised to hire a digital transactions lead in the country.

A WhatsApp move into digital payments in India, its biggest market that is home to 200 million of its billion plus global users, would replicate similar moves by messaging apps like Tencent Holdings Ltd's WeChat in China.

WhatsApp is working to launch person-to-person payments in India in the next six months, news website The Ken reported earlier on Tuesday, citing unnamed sources.

A job advertisement on WhatsApp's website said it was looking for a candidate with a technical and financial background - who understands India's Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and the BHIM payments app that enable money transfers and merchant payments using mobile numbers - to be its digital transactions lead for the country.

"India is an important country for WhatsApp, and we're understanding how we can contribute more to the vision of Digital India," a WhatsApp spokesman said, referring to a flagship government programme that aims to boost the use of Internet-based services in the country.

"We're exploring how we might work with companies that share this vision and continuing to listen closely to feedback from our users," the spokesman said, declining to elaborate further.

Digital transactions in India have surged after Prime Minister Narendra Modi's shock ban of certain high-value banknotes in November that accounted for more than 80 per cent of the country's currency in circulation at the time.

In February, WhatsApp's co-founder, Brian Acton, had told local media that the app was in early stages of investigating digital payments in the country and that he had talked to the Indian government about the matter.

Just last week, Swedish communications app Truecaller, which has a large user base in India, started a mobile payment service in the country based on the UPI platform. (READ MORE)

Samsung Pay is live in India. Your move, Apple?

Latest Business News - A week back Samsung initiated the registration process for early access to its mobile payment service Samsung Pay in India. And this week, the service has been officially launched for the users who registered for early access program to use Samsung Pay services.

India saw a huge spike in digital payment services post demonetisation drive, which took place on November 8. Since then, a lot many players have entered the arena and are offering digital payment services in different ways. The latest in the arena is Samsung Pay, which took the lead and launched its mobile payment services in India before Apple’s Apple Pay and Google’s Android Pay.

While there is no dearth of e-wallet services and digital payment apps in India, what is it that makes Samsung Pay different from other existing services? Let’s take a look:

What is Samsung Pay

The Samsung Pay is a secure and easy to use mobile payment service available exclusively on select Samsung Galaxy smartphones -- Samsung Galaxy Note5, Samsung Galaxy S7, Samsung Galaxy S7 Edge, Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge+, Samsung Galaxy A7 (2016) (2017) and Samsung Galaxy A5 (2016) (2017).

READ MORE ON - How Samsung Pay works?
CLICK HERE To Watch The Video Of Samsung Pay

Cash deals worth Rs 25,000 cr move to digital mode post note ban: Survey

Latest Business News - Post demonetisation, cash-based transactions worth Rs 25,000 crore have moved to the digital mode, says a survey.

The Economic Research Department of State Bank of India carried out the survey from December 30, 2016 to January 3, 2017 so as to understand the nuances of demonetisation. It showed that 15 per cent of transactions moved to electronic payments such as m-wallets and Point of Sale machines.

"This means that Rs 25,000 crore of cash based transactions have moved to digital in the last two months. If this is so, this is a good beginning," SBI Research said in its Ecowrap report.

This number could have been even higher because the behavioural shift has not happened yet and many merchants still prefer cash transactions when the amount is not large, the survey said, adding that a number of merchants are facing connectivity issue at POS machines.

It further noted that around 69 per cent of the respondents affirmed that their businesses were impacted and the overall decline in business is less than 50 per cent for the majority of the businesses that were impacted.(Read More)

FreeCharge, Twenty Four Seven tie-up to make grocery payments cashless

Latest Business News - India's leading digital wallet and payments firm FreeCharge has announced its partnership with Twenty Four Seven, a leading 'round-the-clock' convenience format retail chain.

With this partnership, FreeCharge consumers can pay for more than 3500 products and services at every Twenty Four Seven store using their FreeCharge wallet.

The customer just needs to install the FreeCharge app and scan the QR code at the outlet to make the payment. These products cut across categories like Beverages, Dairy, General Merchandise, House Needs, Ready Foods and Staples amongst several others. Twenty Four Seven has over 45 Twenty Four Seven stores in Delhi NCR region.

FreeCharge had recently announced its partnership with Grofers to offer cashless grocery purchase for its customers and has tie-ups with retail chains like HyperCity, Heritage Fresh, M K Retail and now Twenty Four Seven marking its presence in the category.

"FreeCharge has always focused on building consumer habits in the digital payments space and grocery shopping is one such use case which can help drive this transformation. Through this association, we'll help consumers go cashless for their grocery and other purchases at Twenty Four Seven and experience the ease of digital payments," said Chief Business Officer FreeCharge, Sudeep Tandon.(Read More)

BHIM: Aadhaar-based app launched to simplify digital payments

Breaking News - Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday launched an Aadhaar-based mobile payment application called BHIM (Bharat Interface for Money).

On day 50 of the window provided by the government to citizens to exchange or deposit old currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 denominations, the Prime Minister at a 'Digi Dhan Mela' event in the capital, asked citizens to make at least five digital transactions, so as to understand the concept behind e-payments, and then use it extensively.

"Download it on a smartphone or on a feature phone. It is not necessary to have the internet for this app. In the next two weeks, one more work is being done, which will increase the power of BHIM so much that you would be able to withdraw money even with your fingerprints," he said.

BHIM is a biometric and rebranded version of UPI (Unified Payment Interface) and USSD (Unstructured Supplementary Service Data). It is expected to minimise the role of plastic cards and point-of-sale machines, once believed essential for a less-cash society.(Read More)