The National Payments Corp. of India has informed banks that it will charge remitting institutions 0.1 rupees (0.002 U.S. cents or 0.0015 euros) for every mobile transaction that flows through the interbank funds-transfer service it launched last year, the company announced March 14.
The policy will commence April 1 and will stay in place for at least one year, according to a National Payments spokesperson. The service had been free.
The corporation rolled out its instant interbank mobile fund-transfer service in November, which enables customers of partner banks in the country to exchange funds with one another (
During the launch, the corporation had said it intended to charge 1 rupee per transaction. “But we decided to keep the fee lower to further push adoption to go beyond the 6.6 million users already registered for the service,” the spokesperson says.
Banks are free to charge for the service, according to the spokesperson. Such institutions as ICICI Bank Ltd. and State Bank of India Ltd. have indicated they may impose a charge for the service starting April 1, while others such as Corporation Bank Ltd. have said that they will decide later whether to assess a fee for the service.
